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THE   STORY   OF   THE 
AMERICAN    MERCHANT    MARINE 


THE  MACMILLAN  COMPANY 

NEW  YORK    •    BOSTON   -    CHICAGO 
ATLANTA  •    SAN    FRANCISCO 

MACMILLAN  &  CO.,  Limited 

LONDON  •    BOMBAY  •    CALCUTTA 
MELBOURNE 

THE  MACMILLAN  CO.  OF  CANADA,  Ltd. 

TORONTO 


THE  STORY 


OF    THE 


AMERICAN  MERCHANT  MARINE 


BY 

JOHN    R.    SPEARS 

AUTHOR  OF   "  STORY  OF  THE   NEW   ENGLAND 
WHALERS,"   ETC, 


ILLUSTRATED 


THE   MACMILLAN    COMPANY 
1910 

All  rights  reserved 

1 3  ^w  tt  i  b 


Copyright,  igio. 
By  the   MACMILLAN  COMPANY. 


Set  up  and  electrotyped.     Published  March,  1910. 


NoriDooli  ^reB8 

J.  8.  Gushing  Co.  —  Berwick  &  Smith  Co. 

Norwood,  Mass.,  U.S.A. 


S74  5 


CONTENTS 

CHAPTER  PAGE 

I.  In  the  Beginning i 

II.  Early  Growth .22 

III.  Evolution  of  the  Smuggler  and  the  Pirate      40 

IV.  Before  the  War  of  the  Revolution      .        .      59 
V.  Merchantmen  in  Battle  Array       ...      85 

VI.     Early    Enterprise    of    the    United    States 

Merchant  Marine 100 

VII.     French  and  Other  Spoliations        .        .        .119 

VIII.     The  British  Aggressions 132 

IX.     The  Beginnings  of  Steam  Navigation     .        .150 
X.     Privateers,    Pirates,    and    Slavers    of    the 

Nineteenth  Century 177 

XI.     The  Harvest  of  the  Sea  before  the  Civil 

War 197 

XII.     The  Packet  Lines  and  the  Clippers       .        .    214 

XIII.  Deep-water  Steamships  —  Part  I     .        .        .    240 

XIV.  Deep-water  Steamships  —  Part  II    ••■s^*        •    258 


XV.     The  Critical  Period 


277 


XVI.     During  a  Half  Century  of  Depression         .    298 


ILLUSTRATIONS 

South  Street,  New  York;  from  Maiden  Lane,  1834  .        Frontispiece 

PAGE 

An  Early  View  of  Charleston  Harbor       .         .         .         .         .  38 

Captain  Kidd's  House  at  Pearl  and  Hanover   Streets,  New 

York,  1691 70 

Custom  House,  Salem 100 

Elias  Hasket  Derby 108 

An  Early  Type  of  Clipper  Ship  :  Maria,  of  New  Bedford,  built 

1782 122 

A  Virginia  Pilot-boat,  with  a  Distant  View  of  Cape  Henry,  at 

the  Entrance  of  the  Chesapeake 148 

Engines  of  the  Clermont 158 

Clipper  Ship  Syren 220 

Captain  Samuel  Samuels 222 

Clipper  Ship  Witch  of  the  Wave 232 

Sailing  of  5r//a««/«,  February  3,  1844    .....  254 

Four-master  Dirigo,  First  Steel  Ship  built  in  the  United  States  298 

Stvtn-m2iSitdi  Schooner  Thomas  Lawson          ....  312 

A  Modern  Clipper  Ship  and  a  Modern  Brig     ....  318 

Cunard  S.  S.  Lusitania 334 


THE  STORY  OF  THE   MERCHANT 
MARINE 

CHAPTER   I 

IN  THE   BEGINNING 

THE  first  vessel  built  within  the  limits  of  the 
United  States  for  commercial  uses  was  a  sea- 
going pinnace  of  thirty  tons  named  the  Vir- 
ginia. Her  keel  was  laid  at  the  mouth  of  the  Kennebec 
River,  in  Maine,  on  an  unnamed  day  in  the  fall  of  1607. 
The  story  of  this  vessel,  though  brief,  is  of  great  interest 
because,  in  part,  of  certain  peculiarities  of  rig  and  hull 
which,  in  connection  with  a  sea-going  vessel,  now  seem 
astounding,  but  chiefly  because  it  portrays  something  of 
the  character  of  the  men  who,  a  little  later,  laid  the 
foundations  of  the  American  Republic. 

The  adventure  which  led  to  the  building  of  the  Virginia 
grew  out  of  that  wonderful  harvest  of  the  sea,  the  cod 
fishery  on  the  banks  of  Newfoundland.  For  more  than  a 
hundred  years  before  she  was  built  many  fishermen  of 
Europe  had  been  sailing  to  the  Banks  in  early  spring  and 
returning  home  each  fall.  Throughout  the  sixteenth 
century  there  were  from  100  to  300  fishing  vessels  there 


2        THE  STORY  OF  THE   MERCHANT  MARINE 

every  year,  excepting  only  those  years  when  wars  raged 
the  hardest.  In  1577,  for  instance,  as  the  records  show, 
350  vessels  sailed  for  the  Banks,  gathered  their  harvest, 
went  ashore  in  the  bay  where  St.  John,  Newfoundland, 
now  stands,  cured  the  catch  on  flakes  built  on  the  beach, 
and  then  sailed  for  home  well  satisfied. 

Though  dimly  seen  now,  those  fishermen,  as  they  flocked 
across  the  sea  in  the  spring,  form  one  of  the  most  striking 
pictures  in  history.  For  no  one  had  ever  charted  the  west- 
ern limits  of  that  waste  of  waters.  The  Banks  lay  beyond 
a  belt  of  the  sea  famous,  or  infamous,  as  the  "roaring  for- 
ties." And  yet  in  ships  so  rude  that  the  hulls  were  some- 
times bound  with  hawsers  to  hold  them  together  these  men 
anchored  where  black  fogs  shut  them  in,  where  sleet- 
laden  gales  were  a  part  of  their  common  life,  where  bergs 
and  fields  of  ice  assaulted  them,  and  where  irresistible 
hurricanes  from  the  unknown  wilds  beyond  came  to  over- 
whelm them.  To  these  real  dangers  they  added  others 
that,  though  born  of  the  imagination,  were  still  more 
terrifying.  They  saw  evil  spirits  in  the  storm  clouds,  and 
demons  came  shrieking  in  the  gales  to  carry  their  souls 
to  eternal  torment. 

Even  in  pleasant  weather  life  was  hard.  Masters  ruled 
their  crews  by  torture.  To  punish  an  obstinate  sailor 
they  wrapped  a  stout  cord  around  his  forehead  and  then 
set  it  taut  until  his  eyes  were  popped  from  the  sockets. 
The  food  brought  from  home  spoiled.  In  the  best  vessels 
the  crew  slept  in  leaking,  unwarmed  forecastles,  while 


IN  THE   BEGINNING  3 

in  some  of  the  vessels  —  those  that  were  but  partly  decked 
over  —  they  slept  unsheltered.  The  brine  of  the  sea 
covered  them  with  sores  called  sea  boils,  and  their  hands 
dripped  blood  as  they  hauled  in  their  cod  lines. 

Consider  further  that  these  fishermen  came  from  four 
nations  that  were  always  at  war  with  each  other,  either 
openly  or  in  an  underhanded  way.  And  yet  the  English, 
the  French,  the  Spanish,  and  the  Portuguese  anchored  side 
by  side  on  the  Banks,  built  their  flakes  side  by  side  on  the 
Newfoundland  beach,  and  when  a  ship  opened  her  seams 
as  she  wallowed  in  the  gale,  the  crews  of  the  others  within 
reach  eagerly  lowered  their  boats  to  rescue  the  drowning. 

In  courage,  fortitude,  sea  skill,  and  resourcefulness  those 
Banks  fishermen  had  never  been  surpassed. 

This  is  by  no  means  to  say  that  the  fishermen  never 
fought  each  other.  Good  fair  figh  ting  was  a  part  of  the  com- 
fort of  life  as  they  saw  it.  But  the  conditions  that  elimi- 
nated the  weaklings  naturally  created  in  their  minds  a  stand- 
ard of  justice  under  which  all  who  survived  could  work. 

Let  it  be  noted  now  that  with  all  their  hardships  they 
were  not  without  compensating  rewards.  Good  digestion 
waited  on  appetite.  The  life  ashore  while  curing  the  catch 
—  a  life  where  venison  and  wild  fowl  replaced  their  salted 
meats,  and  the  red  people  of  the  region  came  to  visit 
them  —  was  a  time  for  jollification.  But  more  important 
than  all  else  they  had  leisure  as  well  as  hard  work.  For 
having  a  share  in  the  catch  instead  of  wages,  they  obtained 
enough  money,  on  reaching  home,  to  enable  them  to  pass 


4        THE   STORY  OF  THE   MERCHANT   MARINE 

the  winter  beside  the  hearthstone,  where  they  told  tales 
of  adventures  that  stirred  the  blood.  So  the  love  of  the 
sea  was  cultivated  and  the  race  was  perpetuated. 

Into  the  midst  of  these  fishermen,  as  they  worked  among 
their  flakes  upon  the  Newfoundland  beach,  came  Sir  Hum- 
phrey Gilbert,  on  August  5,  1583,  who  was  the  forerunner 
of  the  New  England  colonists.  He  told  them  he  had  come 
to  take  possession  of  the  country  and  establish  an  English 
colony  there.  The  fishermen  saw  that  such  a  settlement 
would  interfere  with  their  business,  but  no  resistance  was 
made  while  he  erected  a  monument  and  did  such  other 
things  as  the  customs  of  the  day  required  of  those  taking 
possession  of  a  new  land.  One  may  fancy  they  saw  in 
Sir  Humphrey  a  man  of  their  own  sort.  For  he  had 
crossed  the  sea  in  the  ten -ton  Squirrel,  and  although  she 
was,  as  they  said,  "too  small  a  bark  to  pass  through  the 
ocean  sea  at  that  season  of  the  year,"  he  sailed  in  her 
when  bound  for  home ;  he  would  not  ask  his  men  to  take 
a  risk  which  he  would  not  share.  And  when  the  storm 
that  overwhelmed  him  came,  he  sat  down  at  the  stern  of 
the  little  bark  with  a  book  in  his  hand,  and  shouted  in  a 
cheerful  voice  to  the  crew  of  the  Hind,  which  was  close 
alongside :  — 

"We  are  as  near  to  heaven  by  sea  as  by  land." 
The  sailors  of  Gilbert's  expedition  have  been  called 
"no  better  than  pirates"  (Bancroft),  but  at  worst  they  were 
able  to  cherish  the  abiding  faith  of  their  master  as  ex- 
pressed in  those  words.     The  seamen  who  sailed  (1530) 


IN  THE  BEGINNING  5 

with  William  Hawkins  in  that  "tall  and  goodlie  ship  of 
his  own,"  the  Paul,  to  the  coasts  of  Africa  and  Brazil,  and 
with  Drake  in  the  Pelican  in  that  famous  voyage  around 
the  world,  and  with  Raleigh's]  expedition  to  the  coast  of 
North  Carolina,  were  recruited  from  among  these  fisher- 
men, to  whom  adventure  was  as  the  breath  of  life.  And 
the  men  who  did  the  actual  work  of  building  the  Virginia 
were  of  the  same  class. 

As  the  reader  remembers,  the  first  charter  of  Virginia 
as  a  colony  provided  for  two  colony-planting  companies. 
One,  the  London  Company,  settled  its  colonists  in  what  is 
now  the  State  of  Virginia,  while  the  other,  the  West-of- 
England  or  Plymouth  Company,  was  to  people  the  north- 
ern coast.  In  May,  1607,  the  Plymouth  Company  sent  two 
vessels  to  establish  a  fishing  colony  on  what  is  now  the 
coast  of  Maine.  One  of  the  vessels  was  a  "fly-boat" 
called  the  Gift  of  God.  A  fly-boat  was  a  flat-bottomed, 
shoal-draft  vessel  handy  for  exploring  inland  waters. 
The  other  was  "a  good  ship"  named  the  Mary  and  John. 
These  ships  shaped  their  course  to  an  island  off  the  coast 
then  well  known  to  the  fishermen,  and  now  called  Mon- 
hegan,  "a  round  high  He,"  where  they  arrived  on  August 
9.  On  the  1 8th  they  located  their,  settlement  on  a 
peninsula,  on  the  west  side  of  the  mouth  of  the  Kennebec, 
which  was  "almost  an  island."  There  they  erected 
dwellings,  a  storehouse,  and  a  church,  with  a  fort  enclos- 
ing all.  Then  "the  carpenters  framed  a  pretty  pinnace 
of  about  30  tons,  which  they  called  the  Virginia,  the  chief 


6        THE   STORY   OF   THE   MERCHANT   MARINE 

shipwright  being  one  Digby  of  London."  A  plan  of  the 
fort  as  "  taken  by  John  Hunt,  the  VIII  day  of  October  in 
the  yeere  of  our  Lorde  1607,"  is  reproduced  in  Brown's 
Genesis  of  the  United  States.  This  chart  is  important 
because  it  shows  under  the  guns  of  the  fort  a  small  vessel 
which  was,  no  doubt,  the  "pretty  pinnace"  Virginia. 

While  the  dimensions  of  the  Virginia  were  not  recorded, 
we  can  get  a  fair  idea  of  her  size  from  Charnock's  History 
of  Marine  Architecture  (II,  431),  where  a  smack  named 
the  Escape  Royal,  in  1660,  was  of  34  tons  burden  and  30 
feet  6  inches  long  by  14  feet  3  inches  wide,  and  7  feet  9 
inches  deep.  The  30-ton  Virginia  was  not  far  from  these 
dimensions.  She  carried  a  spritsail  and  a  jib.  As  the 
sail  spread  was  insufficient  for  driving  the  vessel  in  light 
airs  and  confined  waters,  oars  were  provided.  The  hull 
was  partly  decked,  enough  to  protect  the  cargo. 

The  crew  had  to  be  content  with  an  awning  when  the 
wind  was  light.  When  the  wind  was  heavy,  they  had  to 
face  the  gale,  as  was  the  custom  on  the  Banks.  And  yet 
the  Virginia  was  built  by  men  who  intended  to  use  her 
not  only  in  the  fishery  and  the  coasting  trade  with  the 
Indians,  but  for  oversea  trade  as  well.  It  is  a  matter  of 
record,  too,  that  she  made  at  least  one  voyage  from  Eng- 
land to  the  Chesapeake,  and  it  is  believed  that  some  of  the 
Kennebec  colonists  sailed  in  her  upon  that  voyage. 

Curiously  enough,  however,  the  Kennebec  colony  failed 
somewhat  ingloriously.  The  winter  was  long  and  severe. 
A  fire  destroyed  the  storehouse  and  the  provisions  that 


IN  THE   BEGINNING  7 

had  been  brought  from  England.  The  unexplored  wilder- 
ness oppressed  them.  In  fact,  while  they  would  face  a 
hurricane  at  sea  in  an  open  boat,  the  terrors  of  the  wilder- 
ness, though  chiefly  of  their  own  imagining,  drove  them 
away,  and  they  were  hard  pressed  at  home  to  find  excuses 
for  what  they  had  done. 

In  the  meantime  a  settlement  was  made  at  Jamestown, 
Virginia.  Of  the  105  colonists  at  Jamestown,  48  were 
described  as  gentlemen,  12  as  laborers,  4  as  carpenters, 
and  the  others  as  servants  and  soldiers.  The  servants 
were  white  slaves,  who  were  not,  however,  held  for  life. 
The  ships  with  this  oddly  assorted  colony  arrived  in  the 
Chesapeake  on  April  20,  1607.  Of  the  things  done  at 
Jamestown  two  only  need  be  considered  here.  They 
began  creating  a  merchant  marine  in  161 1  by  building  a 
shallop  of  twelve  or  thirteen  tons'  burden.  A  Spaniard 
who  visited  the  colony  at  that  time  noted  that  the  iron 
used  in  the  boat  had  been  taken  from  a  wreck  at  Bermuda 
—  a  fact  that  shows  the  colonists  had  not  had  enough  in- 
terest in  ship-building  to  bring  iron  for  that  purpose  from 
home. 

The  truth  is  the  Virginia  colonists  never  had  much  in- 
terest in  shipping,  save  only  as  they  built  many  vessels  of 
small  size  for  use  in  local  transportation  on  their  inland 
waters.  The  reason  for  this  condition  of  affairs  is  pointed 
out  in  Bruce's  Economic  History  of  Virginia.  The 
money  crop  was,  as  it  is  now,  in  many  parts  of  the  State, 
tobacco.     Tobacco  had  been  introduced  into  England  in 


8        THE   STORY   OF   THE   MERCHANT   MARINE 

1586.  The  settlers  found  the  Indians  cultivating  it  on 
the  James  River,  but  they  gave  little  heed  to  it  until  1612, 
when  John  Rolfe,  the  first  American  "squaw  man,"  began 
producing  it  partly  for  his  own  use  and  partly  because  he 
was  trying  to  find  some  product  that  could  be  exported  to 
England  with  profit.  Thus  Rolfe's  garden  was-  the  first 
American  agricultural  experiment  station.  Under  cul- 
tivation the  leaf  produced  was  of  better  quality  than  that 
obtained  from  the  Indians,  and  when  a  trial  shipment  was 
sent  to  England  the  success  of  the  venture  was  great. 
Thereupon  the  colonists  became  so  eager  to  produce  it 
that  the  authorities  felt  obliged  to  prohibit  the  crop  unless 
at  least  two  acres  of  grain  were  grown  at  the  same  time 
by  each  planter. 

The  demand  for  Virginia  tobacco  increased  until  the 
merchants  sent  their  agents  to  the  colony  to  buy  and  pay 
for  the  crop  long  before  it  was  harvested;  they  even  sent 
ships  to  lie  there  for  months  before  the  harvest  in  order  to 
have  first  chance  to  secure  it.  •  Why  should  the  Virginians 
build  or  buy  ships  under  such  circumstances? 

Now  consider  some  of  the  conditions  surrounding  the 
first  New  England  settlers.  Many  fishermen  had  visited 
the  New  England  coast  before  a  settlement  was  made 
there.  These  adventurers  found  full  fares  and  they 
looked  upon  the  coast  at  a  season  when  it  was  not  "stern." 

It  was  to  this  coast  that  the  Pilgrims  came. 

Of  the  well-known  story  of  the  Pilgrims  it  seems  neces- 
sary to  recall  here,  first  of  all,  the  fact  that  they  were  Eng- 


IN  THE   BEGINNING  9 

lishmen  who  had  lived  for  several  years  among  the  Dutch, 
a  people  who  described  themselves  upon  their  coinage  as 
a  nation  whose  "way  is  on  the  sea."  More  than  a  thou- 
sand ships  were  built  every  year  in  Holland  where  the 
Pilgrims  were  sojourning,  and  everybody  lived  in  a  sea- 
faring atmosphere.  Though  a  distinct  people,  the  Pilgrims 
necessarily  absorbed,  as  one  may  say,  something  of  the 
Dutch  af)titude  for  trade  and  sea  life.  Thus,  when  ready 
to  migrate  to  America,  they  were  able  to  secure  the  capital 
they  needed  for  the  venture  from  merchants  who  were 
acquainted  with  the  success  that  had  attended  the  fishing 
voyages  to  the  coast. 

It  is  worth  noting,  too,  that  Captain  Thomas  Jones,  of 
the  Mayflower,  had  fished  in  Greenland  waters,  and  that 
Mate  Robert  Coppin  was  carried  as  the  pilot  of  the  ship 
because  he  had  been  on  the  parts  of  the  coast  to  which  the 
expedition  was  bound.  The  Pilgrims  intended  to  settle 
somewhere  near  the  Hudson  River,  but  on  November  11, 
1620,  the  Mayflower  was  found  at  anchor  under  Cape  Cod. 
While  lying  there  a  number  of  the  company  came  to  think 
that  a  settle  ent  there  would  serve  their  purpose  well, 
and  the  reasons  given  in  support  of  this  proposition  are 
of  interest  because  they  show  what  business  ideas  ani- 
mated these  Pilgrims.  The  location,  they  said,  "afforded 
a  good  harbor  for  boats."  It  was  "a  place  of  profitable 
fishing."  "The  master  and  his  mate  and  others  experi- 
enced in  fishing"  preferred  it  to  the  Greenland  fishery 
where  whaling  made  large  profits.     Moreover,  the  situa- 


lo       THE   STORY   OF   THE    MERCHANT   MARINE 

tion  was  "healthy,  secure  and  defensible."  While  the 
desire  for  "freedom  to  worship  God"  was  perhaps  upper- 
most in  their  talk,  as  it  was  in  their  writings,  the  Pilgrims 
were  "  intensely  practical  in  applying  their  theories  of 
Providence  and  Divine  control  to  the  immediate  busi- 
ness in  hand,"  as  Weeden  says,  in  his  Economic  History  of 
New  England. 

After  settling  at  Plymouth,  as  the  reader  remembers, 
life  was  hard  during  the  first  years.  But  the  poetic  rhap- 
sodies about  the  "stern  and  rock-bound  coast"  do  not 
convey  an  accurate  idea  of  the  agricultural  possibilities 
of  the  region.  Some  of  the  farm  lands  of  eastern  Massa- 
chusetts are  among  the  most  prolific  and  profitable  in  the 
nation.  The  average  yield  of  Indian  corn  per  acre  in 
Massachusetts  in  1907  (see  Year  Book,  Department  of 
Agriculture)  was  exceeded  only  by  that  of  Maine  (another 
part  of  the  "stern  and  rock-bound  coast")  and  that  of 
the  irrigated  lands  of  Arizona.  Arizona  averaged  37.5 
bushels  per  acre,  Maine  37,  and  Massachusetts  36.  Con- 
sider, too,  that  it  was  in  April,  "while  the  birds  sang  in 
the  woods  most  pleasantly,"  that  Squanto  and  Hobomoc, 
red  neighbors,  taught  these  Englishmen  how  to  fertilize 
the  fields  with  fish,  and  to  plant  corn  in  fields  that  the 
Indians  had  cleared.  And  corn,  produced  on  these  fields, 
formed  the  first  cargo  of  the  first  American  sea-trader  of 
which  we  have  a  definite  record. 

Through  various  causes  not  necessary  to  enumerate 
the  Pilgrims  got  on  so  poorly  that  it  was  not  until  1624 


IN   THE   BEGINNING  II 

that  they  began  ship-building.  The  prosperity  that  came 
to  them  in  that  year  was  due  to  success  in  fishing.  They 
took  enough  cod  to  freight  a  ship  for  England.  The 
profit  on  the  cod  was  so  much  beyond  the  immediate  need 
of  the  people  that  they  launched  "two  very  good  and 
strong  shallops  (which  after  did  them  greate  service)." 

As  it  happened,  in  the  year  following  the  building  of 
these  shallops  the  Pilgrims  produced  such  an  abundant 
crop  of  corn  that  they  had  some  to  sell.  Accordingly  they 
loaded  a  shallop  with  it,  and  sent  it,  under  Winslow,  to  the 
Kennebec,  where  he  traded  it  for  700  pounds  of  beaver 
skins. 

A  year  later  a  more  important,  or  at  any  rate  a  more 
profitable,  voyage  was  made.  Some  English  merchants 
who  had  maintained  a  trading-post  on  Monhegan  Island 
sent  word  down  the  beach  that  they  were  going  to  abandon 
it  and  would  sell  the  remainder  of  their  goods  at  a  bargain. 
Although  in  the  years  that  had  passed  the  Pilgrims  had, 
at  times,  come  so  near  to  starvation  that  men  had  been 
seen  to  stagger  in  the  street  because  they  were  faint  with 
hunger,  they  had  persisted.  They  had  caught  and  sold 
fish.  They  had  produced  forest  products  and  corn  for  sale. 
They  had  traded  with  the  Indians  for  furs.  They  had 
traded  with  the  fishermen  who  came  over  from  England, 
and  they  had  made  a  profit  on  every  deal  —  they  had  not 
lived  in  Holland  for  nothing.  When  a  bargain  in  trade 
goods  on  Monhegan  Island  was  offered,  they  had  capital 
to  make  a  purchase,  and  going  there  with  a  shallop  they 


12       THE    STORY   OF   THE   MERCHANT    MARINE 

secured  stuff  worth  ;^400.  Then,  on  finding  at  the  mouth 
of  the  Kennebec  some  other  goods  that  had  been  taken 
from  a  French  ship  wrecked  on  that  coast,  they  bought  an 
additional  ;^ioo  worth,  which  was  all  their  boat  would 
hold,  as  one  may  suppose.  For  as  soon  as  they  reached 
Plymouth  Bay  they  cut  their  shallop  in  two  and  length- 
ened her,  so  that  when  another  opportunity  was  offered 
to  buy  goods  at  a  bargain  she  would  have  a  larger  capacity. 
Recall,  now,  a  number  of  events  occurring  in  America 
before,  and  at  about  the  time  of,  the  first  voyages  of  the 
Pilgrim  shallops.  Henry  Hudson  had  sailed  in  the  Half 
Moon  up  the  river  that  bears  his  name  (September,  1609), 
and  the  Dutch,  after  building  a  few  fur-buying  posts  in 
that  country,  had  begun  a  permanent  settlement  on  the 
lower  end  of  Manhattan  Island  (1623).  Adrien  Block,  a 
Dutch  explorer,  had  built  a  "yacht"  on  Manhattan  Isl- 
and (during  the  winter  of  1614-1615),  that  was  used  later 
in  the  coasting  trade.  At  New  Amsterdam  the  Dutch 
built  many  small  boats  for  gathering  furs  on  the  Hudson, 
and  they  repaired  ships  coming  to  the  port  when  there 
was  need.  But  as  late  as  October  10,  1658,  J.  Aldrichs 
wrote  a  letter  from  that  town  saying,  in  connection  with  a 
"galliot"  that  was  needed  for  local  use  (N.Y.C.  docs.  II, 

51):- 

"We  are  not  yet  in  condition  to  build  such  a  craft  here." 

At  a  still  earlier  date  the  French  had  made  a  permanent 

settlement  in  Canada.     In  the  long  story  of  the  French 

in  America  it  is  of  interest  to  note  first  that  the  Bretons  and 


IN  THE   BEGINNING  13 

Basques  had  been  among  the  pioneers  on  the  Newfound- 
land fishing  banks.  It  is  not  difficult  to  believe  that 
the  Basques  were  there  before  Cabot's  time. 

Of  the  French  explorers  we  need  to  recall  but  one, 
Samuel  de  Champlain,  "young,  ardent,  yet  ripe  in  experi- 
ence, a  skilled  seaman  and  a  practiced  soldier,"  who  had 
been  leading  a  strenuous  life  in  the  West  Indies.  In  1603 
he  made  a  voyage  to  the  St.  Lawrence  River.  In  1604 
he  helped  to  make  a  settlement  on  the  St.  Croix  River, 
where  he  remained  until  the  next  year.  When  a  badly 
needed  relief  ship  came  in  1605,  he  explored  the  New  Eng- 
land coast  down  around  Cape  Cod. 

In  1608  Champlain  built  a  trading-post  where  Quebec 
now  stands,  and  in  16 16  there  were  two  real  home-build- 
ers there,  a  farmer  named  Louis  Hebert  and  Champlain 
himself.  In  1626  the  population  numbered  105,  all  told. 
It  is  not  unlikely  that  the  French  ship,  from  which  the 
Pilgrims  obtained  enough  cheap  goods  to  fill  their  shallop, 
in  their  second  voyage  to  the  Maine  coast,  had  been 
wrecked  while  on  a  voyage  to  Quebec.  The  seafaring 
merchants  of  New  England  inevitably  took  much  interest 
in  the  development  of  this  colony  from  a  rival  nation. 

Still  more  interesting,  though  in  a  different  way,  were 
the  settlements  of  the  West  Indies.  The  Spaniards  had 
introduced  the  sugar-cane  and  negro  slavery,  an  economic 
combination  of  the  greatest  importance  to  the  commerce 
of  the  world ;  for  while  the  Spaniards  maintained,  as  far 
as  possible,  a  monopoly  of  their  own  trade,  both  slavery 


14      THE   STORY   OF  THE   MERCHANT  MARINE 

and  sugar-planting  spread  all  over  the  islands.  Moreover, 
Spanish  exclusiveness  was  to  lead  to  adventures  on  the 
part  of  some  New  Englanders. 

In  1605  the  crew  of  an  English  ship  took  possession  of 
Barbados.  On  February  17,  1625,  an  English  ship  "landed 
forty  English  and  seven  or  eight  negroes"  on  the  island, 
and  thus  began  building  a  colony  that  was  of  the  utmost 
importance  to  New  England  traders  in  later  years.  In 
1676  the  export  of  sugar  "was  capable  of  employing  400 
sail  of  vessels,  averaging  150  tons." 

In  the  meantime  (1619),  a  Dutch  privateer  had  come 
to  Jamestown,  Virginia,  where  "twenty  Africans  were 
disembarked,"  and  sold  to  planters  who  were  to  use  negro 
slaves,  for  many  years  thereafter,  with  profit,  in  the  pro- 
duction of  tobacco.  And  slaves,  sugar,  and  tobacco  were 
among  the  first  articles  of  merchandise  to  bring  profit  to 
the  New  England  ship-owners. 

Most  interesting  of  all,  however,  were  the  centres  of 
population  established  upon  the  New  England  coast.  The 
English  fishermen  who  came  to  the  coast  after  the  arrival 
of  the  Pilgrims,  occasionally  landed  men  to  remain  through 
the  winter  in  order  to  trade  for  furs  and  procure  a  supply 
of  provisions  —  venison,  wild  fowl,  etc.  —  for  the  use 
of  the  crews  of  the  ships  that  were  to  return  in  the  spring. 

Of  this  character  was  a  settlement  made  at  Cape  Ann  in 
1623.  The  Rev.  John  Wliite,  of  Dorchester,  England, 
having  become  interested  in  the  fishermen,  persuaded 
some  merchants  to  send  out  people  to  form  a  colony.     The 


IN    THE   BEGINNING  15 

whole  business  was  badly  managed ;  in  1626  the  merchants 
abandoned  the  colony,  and  most  of  the  people  returned 
to  England.  But  one  Roger  Conant  and  "a  few  of  the 
most  honest  and  industrious  resolved  to  stay."  They 
removed,  however,  to  a  point  on  the  coast  known  as 
Naumkeag,  where  they  made  a  settlement  which  they 
named  Salem. 

In  the  meantime  White  had  been  working  faithfully  in 
England  to  promote  the  interests  of  these  men,  and  in 
1628  sixty  or  seventy  emigrants  were  sent  over  to  join 
them.  In  1629  White  and  other  English  Puritans  pro- 
cured a  charter  for  "a  colony  under  the  title  of  The 
Governor  and  Company  of  Massachusetts  Bay."  The 
settlers  who  came  to  America  and  lived  under  this  charter 
were  the  "Puritans"  of  American  history,  a  fact  that 
seems  worth  especial  mention  because  a  modem  mark  of 
intelligence  in  New  England  is  found  in  the  ability  to 
distinguish  between  the  "Pilgrims"  who  formed  the  col- 
ony on  Plymouth  Bay,  or  the  "Old  Colony,"  and  the 
"Puritans"  who  made  the  settlements  at  the  head  of 
Massachusetts  Bay. 

The  colonists  who  came  over  in  1628  explored  the  head 
of  the  bay,  and  some  of  them  located  where  Charlestown 
now  stands.  With  its  dancing  waters,  its  green  islands, 
and  its  views  of  the  distant  blue  hills  from  which  the  Ind- 
ians had  already  called  it  Massachusetts,  the  region  was 
enchanting,  and  the  Puritan  explorers  described  it  in  such 
glowing  colors  that  200  more  settlers  were  brought  over 


l6      THE   STORY   OF  THE   MERCHANT   MARINE 

the  next  year.  The  Puritans  were  the  original  "boomers" 
of  America. 

Among  the  200  who  arrived  in  1629  there  were  wheel- 
wrights, carpenters,  and  ship-builders.  The  ship-build- 
ers went  up  the  Mystic  River  to  the  place  where  Medford 
now  stands,  and  established  a  shipyard.  A  considerable 
number  of  the  emigrants  of  1630  joined  them.  This  was 
the  first  American  shipyard,  properly  so  called. 

It  is  also  to  be  noted  that  some  of  these  emigrants, 
under  the  lead  of  John  Winthrop,  located  on  the  penin- 
sula opposite  CharlestowTi,  which  was  distinguished  by 
a  three-pointed  hill  and  a  "  Backbay,"  where  they  built  a 
town  named  Boston. 

The  French,  having  a  water-road  to  the  far-away  re- 
gions of  the  Great  Lakes,  became  wholly  absorbed  in 
the  fur  trade.  The  Dutch  on  the  Hudson,  though  less 
favorably  situated,  had  a  western  outlet  through  the 
Iroquois  Indian  country,  and  did  a  large  business  in  furs. 
The  English  on  Barbados,  having  a  favorable  climate, 
a  fertile  soil,  and  slaves,  were  preparing  to  supply  all 
Englishmen  with  sugar,  w^hile  the  English  on  the  Chesa- 
peake, having  facilities  similar  to  those  at  Barbados,  were 
already  astonishing  the  commercial  world  with  their 
product  of  tobacco. 

The  New  Englanders  had  no  considerable  back  country 
from  which  they  could  draw  furs;  they  had  no  water 
route  to  the  interior,  and  at  that  time  they  were  unable 
to  produce  any  crop  from  the  soil  for  which  a  good  market 


IN   THE   BEGINNING  17 

could  be  found  in  Europe.  But  what  they  lacked  in  these 
respects  they  made  up  by  hard  work  in  the  development 
of  such  resources  as  their  country  afforded.  The  histories 
of  New  England  are  full  of  tales  of  privation  and  suffering 
endured  during  the  first  years  of  their  existence,  and  the 
stories  are  all  true.  But  as  soon  as  those  settlers  had 
learned  how  to  supplement  their  prayers  for  daily  bread 
by  well-directed  efforts  to  secure  it,  hunger  fled.  They 
then  saw  that  the  waters  laving  their  feet  were  inviting 
them  to  go  afloat  to  seek  fortune  in  the  uttermost  parts 
of  the  earth,  and  they  accepted  the  invitation. 

On  July  4,  1 63 1  (the  fact  that  it  was  on  July  4  has 
attracted  the  attention  of  more  than  one  New  Englander 
as  a  "beautiful  coincidence"),  the  ship-builders  on  the 
Mystic  launched  their  first  sea-going  vessel.  "The  bark, 
being  of  thirty  tons,"  was  named  the  Blessing  of  the  Bay. 
Her  owner,  Governor  John  Winthrop,  recorded  his 
reason  for  building  her :  — 

"  The  general  fear  of  want  of  foreign  commodities,  now 
that  our  money  was  gone,  set  us  on  w^ork  to  provide  ship- 
ping of  our  own." 

That  statement  was  characteristic  of  the  people  as  well 
as  of  Winthrop.  A  "want" — any  want  —  "set  them 
on  work"  to  provide  for  themselves. 

The  Blessing  of  the  Bay  was  not  a  "bark"  according 
to  modern  nomenclature.  She  was  a  vessel  of  one  mast, 
and  much  like  the  vessel  built  by  the  less  persistent  people 
in  the  earlier  settlement  at  the  mouth  of  the  Kennebec. 


1 8      THE   STORY  OF  THE   MERCHANT   MARINE 

On  August  31  she  "went  on  a  voyage  to  eastward,"  to 
trade  with  the  Indians,  beyond  a  doubt,  and  to  pick  up 
such  business  as  might  be  offered  by  the  few  settlers  and 
the  fishermen  to  be  found  along  shore.  The  fishing  and 
trading  station  which  "fishmongers  in  London"  had 
built  on  the  Piscataqua,  at  which  no  planting  was  done, 
was  probably  the  most  important  point  visited. 

Another  incident  of  this  year,  1631,  is  of  almost  as  much 
interest  as  the  launch  of  the  Blessing  of  the  Bay.  One 
John  Winter  established  a  shipyard  on  Richmond  Island, 
off  Cape  Elizabeth  (near  the  site  of  the  modern  Portland), 
Maine.  Some  time  in  December  Winter  began  to  build 
there  a  ship  for  merchants  in  Plymouth,  England.  As 
already  noted,  other  ships  had  been  built  in  America  by 
Europeans  for  European  use,  but  Winter's  work  may  be 
called  the  beginning  of  the  American  business  of  building 
ships  for  export. 

Three  facts  about  Winter's  shipyard  may  be  correlated. 
In  1638  sixty  men  were  at  work  in  it.  During  the  year  a 
300-ton  ship  brought  a  cargo  of  wines  and  liquors  to  the 
island.  "It  was  a  sporadic"  settlement,  and  it  "dwindled 
away." 

Winthrop's  Blessing  of  the  Bay  appears  to  have  been  the 
first  New  England  vessel  to  open  trade  with  the  Dutch 
on  Manhattan  Island.  She  went  there  in  1633,  perhaps 
sooner.  In  1627  the  Dutch  had  invited  "friendly  com- 
mercial relations"  with  the  Pilgrims  by  sending  the  gov- 
ernor of  the  colony  "a  rundlet  of  sugar  and  two  Holland 


IN  THE  BEGINNING  19 

Cheeses,"  with  a  letter  in  which  they  offered  to  "accom- 
modate" —  to  give  credit.  But  the  Pilgrims  were  shy  be- 
cause the  Dutch  had  been  trading  with  the  Connecticut 
Indians,  a  region  claimed  by  the  English;  the  Dutch  had 
come  even  to  the  head  of  Buzzard's  Bay,  where  the  Pil- 
grims were  maintaining  a  post  for  the  fur  trade.  How- 
ever, in  September,  1627,  the  Dutch  sent  Isaac  de  Rasieres 
with  a  small  trial  cargo  in  the  "barque  Nassau"  to  see 
what  he  could  do,  and  he  proved  a  worthy  forerunner  of 
the  great  race  of  American  commercial  travellers.  For 
he  carried  soldiers  and  trumpeters  along,  not  to  fight,  but 
to  do  honor  to  the  occasion  by  means  of  salutes  and  blar- 
ing music ;  and  he  chose  these  men  from  among  the  resi- 
dents of  New  Amsterdam  who  had  known  some  of  the 
Pilgrims  in  Holland.  Indeed,  some  of  them  were  related 
to  the  Pilgrims,  Naturally,  after  "the  joyful  meeting  of 
kindred  as  well  as  friends,"  and  after  much  fine  talk  and 
the  display  of  goods,  —  especially  of  "wampum,"  —  De 
Rasieres  made  what  he  called  "the  beginning  of  a  profit- 
able trade." 

Wampum  (bits  of  sea-shell)  was  the  coin  of  the  red  men. 
The  chief  mint  of  the  continent  was  on  Long  Island.  All 
red  men,  at  that  time,  were  much  more  anxious  to  get 
wampum  than  the  silver  coin  of  the  white  man.  The 
Pilgrims  were  glad  to  buy  the  wampum  because  the 
Indians  of  New  England  had  but  little,  and  were  eager 
to  get  it. 

It  was  no  doubt  to  secure  a  supply  of  wampum  and 


20      THE   STORY  OF   THE   MERCHANT   MARINE 

such  West  India  products  as  sugar  and  salt,  in  which  the 
Dutch  traded,  that  Winthrop  sent  his  Blessing  of  (he  Bay 
to  Manhattan  Island. 

Certain  details  of  the  earlier  voyages  should  now  prove 
interesting.  For  instance,  Winthrop's  vessel  was  at  first 
engaged  in  trading  on  her  owner's  account.  She  was  not 
a  freighter,  looking  for  cargo  to  carry  at  a  price  per  ton, 
but  a  floating  store,  so  to  say,  carrying  merchandise  for 
sale  or  exchange.  The  distinction  between  the  freighter  and 
the  ship  trading  on  owners'  account  is  to  be  kept  in  mind. 

After  the  New  Englandcrs  had  spread  to  Connecticut 
there  is  a  record  of  the  employment  of  the  Blessing  of  the 
Bay  as  a,  freighter.  She  carried  goods  from  Massachu- 
setts Bay  to  Connecticut  at  305.  per  ton. 

In  1629  the  freight  rate  between  England  and  Massa- 
chusetts Bay  was  £t,  per  ton.  Passengers  were  carried  at 
;^5  each,  and  horses  at  ;;^io  each.  The  goods  rate  in- 
creased after  a  time. 

That  the  oversea  rates  were  remunerative  is  manifest  from 
the  increase  in  the  number  of  ships  finding  employment  in 
the  trade.  In  1635  the  Secretary  to  the  Admiralty  learned 
that  forty  ships  were  regularly  employed  in  the  trade,  of 
which  "  six  sail  of  ships,  at  least "  belonged  to  the  Americans. 

The  profits  in  the  trade  on  owners'  account  were  also 
recorded.  In  1636  Thomas  Mayhew  and  John  Winthrop, 
Jr.,  as  partners,  sent  a  vessel  to  the  Bermudas,  then  called 
the  Summer  Islands,  where  she  sold  corn  and  pork  and 
bought    oranges,    lemons,    and    potatoes.     Perhaps    that 


IN  THE  BEGINNING  2i 

was  the  first  importation  of  Bermuda  potatoes.  The 
profit  on  the  venture  was  "twenty  od  pounds." 

The  Richmond,  a  30-ton  vessel,  built  by  Winter  at  Rich- 
mond Island,  Maine,  carried  6000  pipe-staves  from  the 
island  to  England,  where  they  were  sold  at  a  profit  of  a 
little  over  £25  per  thousand. 

An  idea  of  the  profits  on  some  of  the  voyages  " eastward" 
to  trade  with  the  Indians  can  be  had  from  the  records  of 
the  Pilgrims,  who,  with  their  shallops,  became  experts  in 
that  line.  Between  1631  and  1636,  inclusive,  the  Pil- 
grims bought  and  shipped  12,150  pounds  of  beaver  skins 
and  1 1 56  of  otter.  "Ye  parcells  of  beaver  came  to  little 
less  than  10,000  li.  [pounds].  And  ye  otter  skins  would 
pay  all  ye  charges,"  as  Governor  Bradford  wrote.  As 
otter  skins  sold  for  from  14  to  155.  a  pound,  "ye  charges" 
in  a  business  that  gave  a  profit  of  "little  less  than  ;^io,ooo" 
did  not  exceed  £'^6'].  And  this  profit  was  made,  although 
the  Pilgrims  had  to  buy  some  of  their  trade  goods  on 
credit  and  pay  40  per  cent  interest  per  annum  on  the  sum 
thus  borrowed. 

It  was  at  this  period  of  the  history  of  the  American 
merchant  marine  that  Captain  Thomas  Wiggin,  an  ob- 
serving shipmaster  from  Bristol,  England,  wrote  a  letter 
about  the  New  Englanders,  in  which  he  said :  — 

"The  English,  numbering  about  two  thousand,  and 
generally  most  mdustrious,  have  done  more  in  three  years 
than  others  in  seven  times  that  space,  and  at  a  tenth  of 
the  expense." 


CHAPTER   II 

EARLY   GROWTH 

ALTHOUGH  geographical  conditions  were  in  most 
respects  against  them,  it  is  manifest  from  any 
study  of  the  New  Englanders  that  their  chief 
mercantile  interests,  during  the  earliest  years,  were  con- 
centrated in  the  fur  trade.  The  Pilgrims  devoted  their 
first  surplus  crop  to  that  trade,  and  the  first  voyage  of 
Winthrop's  Blessing  of  the  Bay  was  to  "eastward."  Ac- 
cording to  the  contracts,  they  had  come  to  make  fishing 
stations;  yet  the  large  profits  made  on  such  furs  as  they 
were  able  to  secure  kept  their  minds  fixed  on  the  Indian 
trade.  But,  happily,  at  an  opportune  moment  a  man 
came  to  Salem  who  was  able  to  see  that  enduring  pros- 
perity could  be  found  by  the  colonists  only  in  the  fisheries ; 
and  by  example  as  well  as  precept  he  speedily  led  them  to 
accept  his  view.  Curiously  enough,  as  it  must  seem  in 
our  modern  view  of  the  profession,  this  man  was  a  clergy- 
man, the  Rev.  Hugh  Peter  (written  also  Peters). 

Few  more  stirring  stories  are  to  be  found  in  the  history 
of  New  England  than  the  biography  of  Hugh  Peter.  He 
was  born  in  England,  of  wealthy  parents,  in  1599,  gradu- 


EARLY   GROWTH  23 

ated  at  Cambridge  in  1622,  and  immediately  took  holy 
orders.  Very  soon,  however,  he  had  (or  made)  such 
trouble  with  the  church  authorities  that  he  had  to  flee  from 
the  country.  Then  he  served  an  English  congregation  in 
Rotterdam  until  1634,  when  he  came  to  New  England 
and  was  made  pastor  of  the  Puritans  at  Salem. 

In  1641  Peter  was  sent  as  ambassador  to  treat  with  the 
Dutch  of  New  Amsterdam  for  a  settlement  of  the  disputes 
over  the  territory  of  Connecticut,  and  the  records  of  his 
work,  especially  the  proposals  which  he  submitted  (N.Y.C. 
docs.  I,  567),  show  that  he  was  a  master  of  diplomacy. 
His  work  with  the  Dutch  led  the  colonists  to  send  him  as 
their  ambassador  to  England,  when  the  civil  war  began 
there.  Being  a  Puritan,  he  naturally  joined  the  hosts  of 
Cromwell  and  with  such  energy  and  zeal  as  were  charac- 
teristic of  the  man. 

In  June,  1645,  he  was  made  "Chaplain  of  the  Train, " 
and  a  little  later  private  secretary  to  Cromwell.  He  was 
with  his  chief  at  the  storming  of  the  castle  at  Winchester 
and  when  the  dour  hosts  swept  over  the  works  at  Basing. 
As  a  special  honor,  and  because  of  his  eloquence,  Crom- 
well sent  him  on  each  occasion  to  tell  Parliament  how  the 
battles  were  won ;  and  the  reader  who  would  like  to  learn 
what  a  preacher  had  to  say  about  such  fighting  as  was 
done  in  those  battles  can  find  one  of  the  addresses  in 
Carlyle's  Cromwell.  Having  been  sent  on  a  mission  to 
Holland,  he  delivered  a  sermon  which  stirred  the  audience 
until  "crowds  of  women"  stripped  the  wedding  rings  from 


24      THE   STORY   OF   THE   MERCHANT   MARINE 

their  fingers  to  aid  in  providing  funds  for  the  work  of  the 
great  Commoner. 

For  his  zeal  he  was  arrested  soon  after  the  Restoration. 
"His  trial  was  a  scene  of  flagrant  injustice,"  and  he  was 
condemned,  hanged,  and  quartered.  But  he  faced  his 
accusers  and  death  as  he  had  faced  all  else  in  life.  He  was 
placed  on  the  gallows  while  one  of  his  friends  was  yet  hang- 
ing there,  and  was  compelled  to  look  on  while  the  corpse 
was  lowered  and  cut  to  pieces.  When  this  had  been  done, 
one  of  the  executioners  turned,  and  rubbing  his  bloody 
hands  together,  said  to  Peter :  — 

"How  like  you  this?" 

But  Peter,  in  a  voice  of  unconcern,  replied  — 

"  I  thank  God  I  am  not  terrified  at  it ;  you  may  do 
your  worst." 

When  Hugh  Peter  came  to  Salem,  he  found  the  people 
of  the  colony,  with  few  exceptions,  living  in  log  houses 
that  had  thatched  roofs  and  dirt  floors.  They  were  fron- 
tiersmen, a  thin  line  of  population  stretched  along  the 
beach.  Although  there  were  masters  and  servants,  there 
was  less  division  of  labor  than  that  fact  would  now  seem 
to  imply.  Owners  and  servants  worked  together.  They 
cut  timber  in  the  forest  for  lumber  and  fuel;  they  built 
houses  of  all  needed  kinds;  they  cultivated  the  soil  and 
they  cared  for  their  cattle.  The  New  World  was  almost 
without  form  and  void,  but  the  divine  power  of  labor  was 
moving  upon  the  wastes.  A  natural-born  leader  wa'j 
needed,  however,  and  Hugh  Peter  was  the  man  for  the 


EARLY  GROWTH  25 

hour.  He  saw  that  the  fur  trade  was  slipping  away  and 
that  some  other  resource  must  be  provided.  Better  yet, 
he  saw  that  the  fisheries  would  provide  a  permanent  pros- 
perity, and  he  began  to  preach  the  gospel  of  good  fish 
markets  in  far  countries.  No  record  of  his  arguments 
remains,  but  we  may  easily  learn  what  he  said  by  reading 
the  contemporary  writings  of  John  Smith,  who  used  the 
facts  vigorously,  as  Peter  did  beyond  a  doubt. 

In  1619  "there  went"  to  America,  said  Smith,  a  ship 
"of  200  tuns  .  .  .  which  with  eight  and  thirty  men  and 
boys  had  her  freight,  which  she  sold  for  ;^2ioo  ...  so 
that  every  poor  sailor  that  had  but  a  single  share  had  his 
charges  and  sixteen  pounds  ten  shillings  for  his  seven 
months  work."  In  1620  three  different  ships  "made  so 
good  a  voyage  that  every  sailor  that  had  a  single  share  had 
twenty  pounds  for  his  seven  months  work,  which  is  more 
than  in  twenty  months  he  should  have  gotten  had  he  gone 
for  wages  anywhere." 

If  a  statement  of  the  gains  of  a  foremast  hand  would 
serve  as  an  effective  argument  in  England,  it  would  be 
much  more  effective  in  New  England,  where  many  men 
low  in  the  social  scale  were  finding  opportunities  to  rise 
— where,  indeed,  men  who  had  come  over  as  indentured 
servants  had  already  become  capitalists  able  to  join  in  a 
venture  afloat.  The  profits  of  the  merchants  were  also 
known  and  printed,  however,  even  though  not  considered 
a  matter  of  first  importance  by  Smith.  Thus  there  was 
a  statement  that  "  the  charge  of  setting  forth  a  ship  of  100 


26      THE   STORY   OF  THE   MERCHANT   MARINE 

tuns  with  40  persons  to  make  a  fishing  voyage"  was  ;;{^42o 
1 15.  The  average  take  of  fish  on  the  American  coast  would 
sell  for  ;^2ioo,  of  which  ;^7oo  would  be  the  share  of  the 
merchant  supplying  the  outfit  costing  ;i^420  us.  His 
profit  on  the  voyage  would  therefore  be  near  100  per  cent, 
even  though  the  prevailing  rate  of  interest  on  bor- 
rowed money  were  40  per  cent.  The  ship-owner  took 
a  third  of  the  income  from  the  voyage,  and  made  a  still 
larger  profit,  for  a  hundred-ton  ship  could  be  built  in 
New  England,  as  Randolph  noted,  for  £4  per  ton. 

With  these  facts  in  hand  Hugh  Peter  went  among  his 
people  preaching  the  gospel  of  enterprise  with  as  much  en- 
thusiasm no  doubt  as  he  felt  and  displayed  later  in  preach- 
ing religious  doctrines  before  Cromwell's  men.  As  a 
result  of  his  work  he  "procured  a  good  sum  of  money  to 
be  raised  to  set  on  foot  the  fishing  business,  and  wrote  into 
England  to  raise  as  much  more."  Further  than  that,  the 
General  Court,  as  the  governing  body  of  the  colony  was 
called,  appointed  six  men  to  fish  "for  general  account." 

The  Salem  people  made  money  from  the  first.  The 
business  spread  to  near-by  Marblehead,  and  the  people 
there  became  so  much  interested  that  when  a  minister  in 
the  pulpit  told  them  that  they  ought  to  seek  the  "king- 
dom of  heaven  to  the  exclusion  of  all  earthly  blessings," 
one  of  the  congregation  interrupted  him  by  saying,  "You 
think  you  are  preaching  to  the  people  at  the  Bay.  Our 
main  end  is  to  catch  fish." 

By  1640  the  Salem  people  had  made  such  progress  and 


EARLY  GROWTH  27 

profits  in  their  fishery  that  they  were  able  to  launch  a  ship 
of  300  tons,  a  monster  of  a  vessel  for  the  day  and  place. 
Moreover,  Boston  people  were  so  wrought  up  by  Peter's 
enterprise  in  this  matter  that  they  also  built  a  ship  at  the 
same  time,  the  Trial,  of  160  (or  200)  tons. 

Unhappily  for  Salem,  her  people  had  no  leader  after 
Peter  sailed  for  England,  and  Boston  soon  gained  the 
ascendency  in  commerce  as  in  politics.  But  for  many  years 
Salem  was  a  port  of  vast  importance  in  the  story  of  our 
merchant  marine. 

In  the  meantime  (1636),  the  Desire,  a  ship  of  120  tons, 
was  built  at  Marblehead  for  the  fishing  business.  It  is 
likely  that  Peter  inspired  the  people  there  to  build  her. 
She  was  engaged  in  fishing  for  two  years  and  then  made 
a  voyage  in  the  slave  trade,  and  thus  acquired  enduring 
notoriety. 

Of  much  more  importance  than  these  large  vessels  in 
promoting  the  shipping  interests  of  the  colonists  were 
the  small  vessels,  smacks,  and  shallops,  which  men  of 
limited  means  built  and  used.  A  seven-ton  shallop  could 
be  built  for  ;^25,  and  in  the  hands  of  her  owners  she  was 
well  able  to  go  fishing.  Friends  and  neighbors  united 
their  labor  as  well  as  their  accumulations  of  capital  in 
sending  the  small  boats  to  sea.  Even  the  dugout  canoe 
which  a  man  could  make  for  himself  was  used  in  the  bay 
fisheries,  and  the  whole  world  was  within  the  reach  and 
grasp  of  a  man  who  had  the  courage  and  enterprise  to 
launch  forth  in  a  dugout  canoe  of  his  own  making.     It 


28      THE   STORY  OF  THE   MERCHANT   MARINE 

was  in  and  through  such  men  that  the  American  colonists 
were  gaining  the  sea  habit. 

The  cod  was  the  fish  of  chief  importance,  though  other 
varieties  were  sent  abroad,  and  used  at  home  in  enormous 
quantities.  Mackerel,  though  some  were  eaten  and  some 
exported,  were  used  chiefly  for  bait.  Sturgeon  eggs  were 
made  into  caviare  then,  as  now,  while  the  flesh  of  the  stur- 
geon was  smoked  and  sold  —  perhaps  as  the  flesh  of  some 
more  delicate  fish.  Hake,  halibut,  and  haddock  were  of 
some  importance,  but  the  one  fish  that  ranked  next  after 
the  cod  was  the  alewife. 

It  is  said  that  alewives  were  so  called  because  their 
well-rounded  abdomens  reminded  the  fishermen  of  such 
of  their  wives  as  were  too  fond  of  malt  drinks !  Millions 
of  alewives  came  to  the  coast  and  swarmed  up  the  streams 
until  the  channels  seemed  to  be  filled  solid  with  the  strug- 
gling bodies.  Seines,  scoop-nets,  and  even  the  naked 
hands  were  used  in  taking  them,  but  the  weir  was  in  com- 
mon use  from  the  first.  Indeed,  the  Indians  used  weirs 
before  the  white  men  came. 

The  people  naturally  looked  upon  these  swarming  fish 
as  common  property,  and  when  weirs  were  built  by  private 
enterprise  and  the  owners  were  thus  able  to  "control  the 
market"  to  a  certain  extent,  laws  were  promptly  enacted 
to  regulate  these  primitive  "trusts."  One  John  Clark 
was  allowed  to  build  a  weir  at  Cambridge  on  condition 
that  he  sell  to  no  one  not  an  inhabitant  of  the  town  "  except 
for  bait."     The  interests  of  the  commonwealth  were  placed 


EARLY  GROWTH  29 

ahead  of  those  of  tlic  small  community  when  there  was  a 
need  of  "bait."  The  price  of  alewives  was  fixed  at  "Ills 
6d  per  thousand."  Another  monopolist  was  to  "fetch 
home  the  alewives  from  the  weir ;  and  he  is  to  have  XVId 
a  thousand  and  load  them  himself  for  carriage;  and  to 
have  the  power  to  take  any  man  to  help  him,  he  paying  of 
him  for  his  work." 

The  importance  of  alewives  to  the  people  is  thus  shown 
clearly.  The  notable  uses  of  alewives  were  as  food,  as 
fertilizers,  and  as  bait,  but  a  few  were  smoked  for  export. 

The  early  laws  governing  the  fisheries  may  well  have 
still  further  consideration  here.  After  Hugh  Peter  began 
arousing  an  interest  in  the  fisheries,  the  General  Court 
exempted  fishing  vessels  from  all  charges  for  a  period  of 
seven  years,  beginning  in  1639.  Fishermen  and  ship 
carpenters  were  excused  from  serving  the  public  on 
training  days.  When  alewives  were  taken  at  the  weirs, 
the  fishermen  were  to  be  served  at  statute-made  prices 
before  any  were  to  be  offered  to  the  public.  This  was 
provided  for,  of  course,  after  the  farmers  had  learned 
their  art  well  enough  to  prevent  the  fear  of  starvation. 
Land  was  set  aside  for  fish-curing  stages,  and  pasture 
was  provided  for  the  cattle  which  fishermen  owned  but 
could  not  attend  to  while  at  sea. 

Until  1648  the  fishermen,  on  coming  ashore  to  "make" 
their  catch,  were  allowed  to  land,  cut  timber,  and  erect 
their  stages  for  the  work  regardless  of  the  ownership  of  the 
ground  where  they  landed.     After  that  date  they   were 


30      THE   STORY   OF  THE   MERCHANT   MARINE 

still  allowed  to  do  the  same  things,  but  they  were  then 
required  to  pay  the  owner  of  the  land  for  the  use  of  land 
and  timber.  In  1652,  to  preserve  the  reputation  of  the 
colony  product  of  fish,  the  law  provided  for  "fish  viewers" 
at  "every  fishing  place,"  whose  duty  it  was  to  separate 
cured  fish  into  grades  according  to  quality. 

Some  details  of  the  early  methods  of  taking  fish  on  the 
Banks  were  recorded.  Neither  the  dory  nor  the  trawl 
had  then  been  developed.  Hand-lines  thrown  from  the 
deck  of  the  fishing  ship  were  used  exclusively.  The 
hooks  and  lines  were  imported  from  England,  and  Smith 
records  the  price:  "12  dozen  of  fishing  lines,  £6;  24 
dozen  of  fishing  hooks,  ;^2."  The  Indians  made  fairly 
good  hooks  of  bones  and  shells.  They  spun  lines  from 
the  fibres  of  Indian  hemp,  which  they  saturated  with 
grease  and  the  wax  of  the  bayberry  bush,  but  the  white 
men  would  not  use  any  such  gear. 

Cod  lines  for  use  on  the  Grand  Banks  were  from 
50  to  75  fathoms  long;  the  lines  now  used  on  the  Georges 
Bank  are  often  as  much  as  150  fathoms  long.  Sinkers 
(conical  plummets  of  lead),  were  from  3  to  8  pounds  in 
weight  according  to  the  strength  of  the  tidal  current 
where  the  fishing  vessel  anchored.  The  enthusiastic 
John  Smith  said:  "Is  it  not  pretty  sport  to  pull  up  two 
pence,  six  pence  and  twelve  pence  as  fast  as  you  can  haul 
and  veer  a  line?"  But  the  fishermen  who  stood  at  the 
rail,  in  freezing  weather,  hauling  a  wet  line  that  was 
75  fathoms  or  more  in  length,  and  weighted  with  8  pounds 


EARLY   GROWTH 


31 


of  lead  and  a  100-pound  codfish,  did  not  find  it  exactly 
"pretty  sport."  Moreover,  hauling  and  veering  did  not 
end  their  work,  for  when  the  school  of  fish  was  lost,  the 
catch  had  to  be  cleaned  and  salted,  even  though  the  men 
had  been  at  the  rail  day  and  night  for  48  hours.  But  the 
work  afforded  better  opportunities  for  "getting  on,"  and 
so  they  found  in  it  the  "  pleasing  content  "  of  which  Smith 
also  speaks. 

As  the  reader  knows,  stoves  were  not  invented  until 
many  years  later,  but  the  fishermen  made  shift  by  carry- 
ing a  half  hogshead  nearly  filled  with  sand.  In  the  centre 
of  the  sand  they  scooped  a  hole  in  which  the  fire  was  built. 
By  means  of  such  a  fire,  built  on  deck,  they  cooked  their 
food,  warmed  themselves,  and  dried  their  wet  clothing. 
The  scene  where  a  fleet  of  fishermen  anchored  together 
on  the  banks  by  night,  and  all  together  cooked  their  suppers 
by  the  flaring  fires,  was  memorable.  One  sees  how  easy 
it  v/as  for  the  imaginative  sailor  to  name  such  a  tub  of 
fire  a  "galley,"  the  name  applied  to  the  modern  ship's 
kitchen. 

In  food  supplies  the  New  Englanders  naturally  fared 
better  than  their  old-country  competitors.  Being  nearer 
home,  they  had  fresh  vegetables  for  a  greater  proportion 
of  the  time  afloat.  Food  was  cheaper,  too,  and  the  cir- 
cumstances or  conditions  under  which  the  food  was  pro- 
duced made  them  more  lavish  in  using  it.  They  raised 
their  own  peas  and  had  barrels  of  them  at  home;  why 
should   they   stint   themselves   on   the  Banks?     To   this 


32       THE    STORY   OF   THE    MERCHANT   MARINE 

day  American  ships  are  noted  for  superior  food  and  hard 
work.  Of  course  they  ate  plenty  of  fish,  as  all  fishermen 
did,  and  they  caught  many  sea-birds,  of  which  they  made 
savory  dishes. 

John  Smith  emphasizes  the  fact  that  in  the  English 
ships  the  catch  was  divided  into  three  parts,  of  which  the 
crew  received  only  a  third,  the  two- thirds  going  to  the 
owner  and  the  merchant  who  fitted  out  the  expedition. 
Where  one  man  owned  and  outfitted  the  ship,  he  took 
the  two-thirds,  of  course.  But  as  Weeden,  in  his  Economic 
History  of  New  England  (quoting  Bourne's  Wells  and 
Kennebunk),  shows,  in  1682-1685,  if  not  earlier,  "the 
capitalist  fitting  out  the  expedition  with  boat,  provisions, 
seines,  &c.,  took  one-half  the  value  of  the  catch,  and 
the  other  part  went  to  the  crew."  In  the  eighteenth 
century  the  share  of  the  capitalist  was  reduced  to  one-fifth. 

The  whale  fishery  of  the  first  half  of  the  seventeenth 
century  was  of  small  importance  in  comparison  with  that 
of  later  years,  but  it  is  still  worth  mention.  The  chief 
source  of  oil  and  bone  seems  to  have  been  found  in  the 
whales  that  died  from  natural  causes  and  drifted  to  the 
beach.  But  men  did  go  afloat  in  chase  when  the  spouting 
spray  and  vapor  were  seen  from  the  shore,  and  laws  were 
provided  at  an  early  day  to  regulate  the  catch.  The 
General  Court,  under  these  laws,  took  a  share  of  all  drift 
whales  —  from  two  barrels  to  a  third  of  the  whole  product. 
In  the  chase  the  first  harpoon  that  held  its  place  claimed 
the  whale.     It  was  provided  "  5ly,  that  no  whael  shall  be 


EARLY   GROWTH  ^^ 

needlessly  or  fouellishly  lansed  behind  ye  vitall."  The 
most  important  fact  here  is  that  at  first  the  men  who 
killed  a  whale  shared  equally.  Later,  when  the  men  of 
superior  skill  claimed  shares  in  proportion  to  the  work 
they  did,  the  "lay"  system  was  evolved.  The  captain 
of  a  ship  received  from  i  barrel  in  17  to  i  in  25 ;  in  recent 
years  still  more.  Mates  had  from  i  in  30  to  i  in  50. 
The  men  who  threw  the  harpoon  had  i  in  75,  say,  while 
foremast  men  had  still  less,  even  down  to  i  in  200  for  a 
green  hand.  No  better  system  for  encouraging  men  to 
do  as  well  as  they  could  has  ever  been  devised. 

Of  similar  importance  was  the  custom  then  prevailing 
of  allowing  the  crews  of  merchant  ships  to  carry  a  "private 
venture."  When  Skipper  Cornells  Ewoutsen,  in  a  Dutch 
cruiser,  captured  four  New  England  ketches  "in  the 
neighborhood  of  Blocx  Island,"  Captain  Richard  Holling- 
worth,  commanding  of  one  of  the  four,  declared  that  he 
was  "freighted  on  account  of  Wharton  and  Company, 
merchants  of  Boston,  with  47  tubs  of  tobacco;  Item, 
6  tubs  of  tobacco  for  Mathew  Cartwright  and  13  tubs  for 
himself  and  crew.  ...  in  all  66  tubs,  with  eight  hides." 
The  crew  owned  nearly  a  fifth  of  the  cargo.  (N.Y.C. 
docs.  II,  662.)  Seamen  before  the  mast  as  well  as  officers 
took  from  port,  in  stated  quantities,  any  commodities 
which  they  supposed  they  could  sell  to  advantage  in  any 
of  the  ports  to  which  the  ship  was  bound.  Here  or  there 
these  goods  were  exchanged  for  others,  which  were  again 
traded  at  other  ports,  or  carried  home  to  be  sold.     Wages 


34       THE   STORY   OF   THE   MERCHANT   MARINE 

were  not  so  very  low  for  common  sailors,  even  by  modern 
standards.  They  received  on  an  average  £2  \os.  per 
month.  Mates  had,  say,  £t^  105,  and  captains  -^^i,  105, 
and,  rarely,  £(>  a  month.  On  top  of  this  the  private 
venture  was  carried  free,  and  the  shrewd  sailormen  often 
made  much  more  on  the  private  venture  than  from  wages. 
It  is  a  matter  of  much  importance. 

The  sailor,  having  a  direct  interest  in  the  voyage,  made 
haste  to  shorten  sail  when  a  squall  threatened  to  carry 
away  the  masts;  he  worked  with  all  his  might  whenever 
any  danger  threatened,  because  she  carried  his  merchandise. 
More  important  still  is  the  fact  that  the  custom  made 
merchants  of  the  men,  and  that  is  to  say,  it  made  them 
self-respecting  and  ambitious.  There  were  instances 
where  the  crew  received  no  wages  whatever;  the  owner, 
master,  and  men  were  all  adventurers  together. 

There  is  no  more  instructive  comparison  in  the  history 
of  the  nation  than  that  between  these  early-day  merchants 
of  the  forecastle  and  the  driven  brutes  before  the  mast 
in  the  clippers  of  a  later  day. 

Consider  now  the  influence  of  the  poverty  of  the  builder 
upon  the  character  of  the  ship.  Capital  was  so  scarce 
that  a  man  worth  ;;^4ooo  was  called  wealthy.  Ships  were 
built  where  scarcely  a  shilling  in  currency  changed  hands. 
The  workmen  were  paid  with  goods.  Where  neighbors 
united  to  build  a  vessel,  they  traded  produce  of  fishery 
field,  or  forest  to  the  merchant  for  such  iron,  sails,  and 
cordage  as  they  needed,  or  they  gave  him  a  share  in  the 


EARLY   GROWTH  35 

vessel.  The  merchant  traded  the  produce  of  the  fisheries 
or  forest  in  Europe  for  the  outfit  he  gave  to  the  builders. 
By  hard  labor  and  severe  economy  only  were  these  vessels 
sent  afloat.  It  was  the  European  fashion  of  the  day  to 
build  ships  with  enormous  cabins  piled  high  at  the  stern 
end,  and  to  ornament  the  superstructures  with  carvings 
and  paints.  The  New  Englanders,  having  no  capital 
to  spare,  had  to  forego  the  pleasure  of  ornamenting  their 
ships  with  decorated  superstructures;  they  were  obliged 
to  consider  efficiency  only.  They  did  not  know  it  at  the 
time,  but  the  fact  was  that  this  enforced  economy  led  to 
an  advance  in  the  art  of  ship-building.  On  navigating 
the  ships  without  superstructures,  it  was  seen  that  the  tall 
cabins  had  made  the  ships  top-heavy,  and  had  served  to 
strain  instead  of  strengthen  the  hulls.  Moreover,  the 
huge  pile  of  timber  had  held  the  ship  back  in  any  winds 
but  the  fairest.  Ships  without  superstructures  were 
stronger,  of  greater  capacity,  swifter  and  handier. 

Then  there  were  the  geographical  influences  which 
affected  the  model  and  rigs  of  ships.  Whether  in  fishing 
or  coasting  voyages,  the  American  ship  must  be  prepared 
to  meet  winds  from  any  point  of  the  compass  on  every 
day  she  was  out  of  port.  The  prevailing  winds  were 
westerly,  but  there  was  neither  trade  wind  nor  monsoon. 
The  ship  must  therefore  be  rigged  to  force  her  w^ay  ahead 
against  adverse  winds.  For  such  winds  the  spritsails, 
lugs,  and  others,  where  the  cloth  was  stretched  fore  and 
aft,  rather  than  to  yards  hung  square  across  the  masts, 


36      THE   STORY   OF  THE   MERCHANT   MARINE 

were  more  convenient.  The  schooner  was  a  natural 
evolution  of  the  coasting  conditions. 

The  waters  of  the  harbors  were  shallow.  In  England 
deep-water  ports  had  favored  deep  hulls,  but  the  American 
designer  who  wished  to  increase  the  capacity  of  a  hull 
had  to  make  it  wider  instead  of  deeper.  Wide  beam 
gave  greater  stability;  a  wide  ship  could  carry  wide  sails 
and  yet  "stand  up  like  a  church"  in  a  heavy  wind.  Of 
course  stout  masts  were  needed  for  wide  sails,  but  the 
forests  were  full  of  enormous  pines  that  could  be  had, 
at  first,  for  the  cutting.  Wide  hulls  of  shoal  draft,  with 
wide  sails  spread  upon  stout  spars,  made  speedy  ships,  a 
fact  that  even  now  is  not  as  well  understood  as  it  should  be. 
The  speedy  ships  invited  their  masters  to  "carry  on"  —  to 
keep  their  sails  spread  full  breadth  while  the  gale  increased 
to  a  weight  that  would  "take  the  sticks  out  of"  vessels  of 
inferior  design.  The  swift  ship,  well  driven,  soon  brought 
fame  as  well  as  additional  profit  to  crew  and  owners,  and 
the  pride  in  the  ship  which  was  thus  developed  led  all  who 
were  in  any  way  connected  with  her  to  look  for  still  further 
improvements. 

The  short  distances  between  harbors  also  had  some 
influence  upon  the  forms  of  ships.  For  one  thing,  short 
passages  favored  small  vessels  with  small  crews.  The 
greater  the  number  of  vessels,  the  greater  the  number  of 
captains  accustomed  to  responsibility,  a  matter  of  no  small 
importance  in  its  effect  upon  the  formation  of  the  sea  habit 
among  a  people.     Then  the  short  passage  naturally  led 


EARLY   GROWTH  37 

the  crew  into  taking  chances ;  they  would  risk  a  growing 
gale  in  a  short  run.  Once  out  of  port  in  "dirty  weather," 
the  manifest  dangers  set  all  hands  thinking  of  improved 
ways  of  shortening  sail  in  an  emergency,  and  of  improved 
shapes  of  hull  and  cut  of  canvas  to  help  a  vessel  to  "claw 
off"  a  lee  shore.  The  men  who  worked  in  the  shipyard 
building  for  themselves,  and  then  went  afloat,  were  partic- 
ularly observant  at  such  times.  One  of  the  most  common 
statements  to  be  found  in  the  stories  of  perils  at  sea,  as 
related  by  American  shipmasters  of  other  days,  is  this : 
"  Every  dollar  I  owned  in  the  world  was  in  that  ship,  and  " 
for  that  reason  every  hardship  was  endured  and  every 
effort  made  to  bring  her  to  port. 

In  1624  the  Pilgrims  exported  their  first  cargo  of  fish. 
Boston  sent  its  first  cargo  away  in  1633.  The  owners 
of  these  fish  had  to  pay  three  or  four  pounds  a  ton  freight; 
and  an  agent  in  England,  who  charged  a  good  commission 
for  doing  so,  found  a  customer  to  buy  them.  The  New 
Englanders  saw  that  the  vessel  carrying  the  cargo  made 
a  profit  for  her  owner.  They  saw,  too,  that  an  agent  in 
a  foreign  country  across  the  water  would  never  have  quite 
the  interest  in  selling  to  advantage  that  they  themselves 
would  have  if  they  were  there  to  sell.  In  short,  if  the  fish 
business  were  to  be  handled  in  the  most  profitable  way 
possible,  they  must  carry  the  cargo  in  their  own  ship  direct 
to  the  consumer.  Hugh  Peter  preached  this  doctrine 
with  emphasis,  beyond  doubt,  for  it  was  he  who  led  in 
building  the  300-ton  ship  at  Salem.     From  catching  fish 


8 


38      THE   STORY   OF   THE   MERCHANT  MARINE 

to  carrying  them  to  the  oversea  market  was  a  short  passage 
quickly  made.  With  this  in  mind,  consider  the  brief  story 
of  the  voyage  of  the  good  ship  Trial,  Captain  Thomas 
Coytemore,  made  after  the  fishing  business  was  well  in  hand. 
The  Trial,  as  noted,  was  the  ship  built  in  Boston  when 
the  people  there  were  stirred  to  emulation  by  the  work  of 
Hugh  Peter  in  Salem.  Loaded  with  fish  and  pipe-staves, 
she  sailed  away  to  Fayal  (1642).  Fayal  was  chosen  be- 
cause the  people  there  had  religious  views  leading  them 
to  eat  fish  instead  of  flesh  on  many  days  of  the  year,-  and 
they  were  wine-makers  who  used  many  casks  every  year. 
The  Trial  found  the  market  at  Fayal  "extraordinary 
good,"  and  Captain  Coytemore  exchanged  the  fish  and 
staves  for  wine,  sugar,  etc.,  which  he  carried  to  St.  Chris- 
topher's, in  the  West  Indies.  There  he  traded  wine  for 
cotton,  tobacco,  and  some  iron  which  the  people  had  taken 
from  a  ship  that  had  been  wrecked  on  the  coast,  and  was 
then  visible,  though  so  far  under  water  that  the  wreckers 
had  abandoned  all  work  upon  it.  As  the  New  Englanders 
were  exceedingly  anxious  to  get  all  kinds  of  iron  things 
used  about  a  ship,  Captain  Coytemore  must  needs  have 
a  look  at  the  wreck,  and  after  due  examination,  he  deter- 
mined to  try  to  recover  more  of  the  wreckage.  Slinging 
a  "diving  tub  "  (doubtless  a  good  stout  cask,  well  weighted, 
and  with  the  open  end  dowTi),  above  the  hulk,  he  got  into 
it,  and  having  been  lowered  to  the  sunken  deck,  made 
shift  to  hook  good  stout  grapnels  to  the  valuable  things 
lying  within  reach. 


u 


EARLY   GROWTH  39 

Comparisons,  though  sometimes  odious,  may  be  excused 
when  instructive.  The  conditions  of  life  in  Canada 
led  the  French  to  devote  themselves  to  furs  only.  The 
Dutch  at  Manhattan  Island  were  absorbed  in  furs  and 
the  trade  of  the  West  India  Company.  The  Virginians 
and  the  English  West  Indians  devoted  themselves  almost 
exclusively  to  producing  tobacco  and  sugar  by  means  of 
slave  labor. 

Under  the  conditions  of  life  in  New  England,  the  people 
became  perforce  farmers,  growing  their  own  food ;  loggers, 
cutting  timber  in  the  near-by  forest  for  use  in  building 
houses,  fishing  smacks,  and  ships ;  fishermen,  going  afloat 
in  the  smacks  and  then  curing  the  catch  on  the  beach; 
seamen,  who,  blow  high  or  blow  low,  carried  the  catch  in 
their  own  ships  direct  to  the  consumer;  traders,  meeting 
the  competition  of  the  keenest  merchants  in  the  world; 
inventors,  who,  when  unable  to  do  their  work  by  methods 
already  in  use,  promptly  improvised  something  new  that 
would  serve  the  purpose. 


CHAPTER  III 

EVOLUTION  OF  THE  SMUGGLER  AND  THE   PIRATE 

AMONG  the  first  acts  of  the  English  Parh'ament 
for  the  regulation  of  the  commerce  of  the  Ameri- 
can colonies,  notable  here,  was  that  passed  in 
1646,  by  which  it  was  provided  that  no  colonial  produce 
should  be  carried  away  to  foreign  ports  except  in  vessels 
under  the  British  flag. 

Since  the  days  of  Raleigh,  who  had  done  his  utmost 
to  create  the  sea  habit  among  his  countrymen,  the  English 
people  had  been  growing  jealous  of  the  enterprising  Dutch, 
who  then  were  carrying  the  commerce  of  the  world.  This 
act  was  a  measure  to  restrain  the  freedom  of  the  Dutch 
carrying  trade  and  to  give  it  to  English  (including  colonial) 
ships.  In  1650,  although  England  was  yet  torn  by  civil 
war.  Parliament  prohibited  all  foreign  ships  from  trading 
with  the  colonies  without  first  obtaining  a  license.  A  year 
later  came  the  culminating  act  of  the  Protector's  Parlia- 
ment, "the  famous  Act  of  Navigation,"  as  McCulloch 
calls  it  (London  edition,  1839,  p.  817).  It  provided  that 
no  goods  produced  or  manufactured  in  Asia,  Africa,  or 
America  should  be  imported  into  any  part  of  the  English  do- 

40 


THE   SMUGGLER  AND    THE    PIRATE  41 

main  except  in  ships  belonging  to  English  subjects  where- 
of the  master  and  more  than  half  the  crew  were  English- 
men. The  importation  of  European  goods  was  prohibited 
except  in  English  ships,  or  ships  belonging  to  the  country 
where  the  goods  were  produced,  or  those  of  the  country 
from  which  they  could  only  be  or  were  most  usually  ex- 
ported. As  is  well  known,  this  act  was  intended  as  a  final 
blow  at  the  Dutch  carrying  trade. 

Consider,  now,  that  "shipping"  means  one  thing, 
"commerce  "or  "trade"  another.  While  modern  American 
"  commerce"  is  increasing  in  a  way  that  seems  marvellous, 
American  shipping  has  been  almost  entirely  driven  from 
the  foreign  "carrying  trade."  The  English  enactments 
relating  to  the  colonies,  from  the  settlement  of  Virginia 
down  to  and  including  the  "famous  Act  of  Navigation," 
were  all  designed  to  favor  all  colonial  commerce  as  well 
as  shipping.  _ 

After  the  Restoration,  Parliament  passed  what  is  known 
as  the  Navigation  Act  of  1660,  which  was  followed  by 
another  in  1663,  which  was  still  more  stringent.  The 
object  of  these  laws,  as  expressly  stated  in  the  later  act 
itself,  was  in  part  "the  maintaining  the  greater  corre- 
spondence and  kindness  between  subjects  at  home  and 
those  in  the  plantations ;  keeping  the  colonies  in  a  firmer 
dependence  upon  the  mother  country;  making  them  yet 
more  beneficial  to  it;  .  .  .  it  being  the  usage  of  other 
nations  to  keep  their  plantation  trade  exclusively  to  them- 
selves." 


42       THE   STORY   OF  THE  MERCHANT  MARINE 

To  this  end  it  was  first  "enacted  "  (to  quote  McCulloch), 
"  that  certain  specified  articles,  the  produce  of  the  colonies, 
and  since  well  known  in  commerce  by  the  name  of  enu- 
merated articles,  should  not  be  exported  directly  from  the 
colonies  to  any  foreign  countries,  but  that  they  should 
first  be  sent  to  Britain,  and  there  unladen  (the  words 
of  the  act  are,  laid  upon  the  shore),  before  they  could  be 
forwarded  to  their  final  destination.  Sugar,  molasses, 
ginger,  fustic,  tobacco,  cotton  and  indigo  were  originally 
enumerated;  and  the  list  was  subsequently  enlarged  by 
the  addition  of  coffee,  hides  and  skins,  iron,  corn  [i.e. 
grain],  lumber,  &c." 

That  is  to  say,  the  colonists  were  compelled  to  take  the 
enumerated  products  to  England  and  there  lay  them  "upon 
the  shore."  The  restriction  was  laid  upon  the  "com- 
merce" of  the  colonists;  there  was  no  restriction  upon  the 
use  of  colonial  ships. 

The  writer  begs  the  indulgence  of  intelligent  readers 
while  he  treats  this  matter  as  if  for  a  kindergarten.  From 
the  days  of  McCulloch  to  the  present  time  no  one  has 
sufficiently  emphasized  the  difference  between  commerce 
and  shipping,  a  distinction  that  must  be  made  entirely 
plain  before  one  can  see  clearly  just  how  these  navigation 
acts  affected  the 'American  merchant  marine. 

Having  compelled  the  colonies  to  send  all  their  enumer- 
ated products  to  England  (it  was  not  necessary  to  sell 
them  there;  they  could  be  reexported  under  certain  reg- 
ulations), Parliament  went  still  further   in   its  effort   to 


THE   SMUGGLER  AND   THE   PIRATE  43 

maintain  a  "greater  correspondence  and  kindness"  be- 
tween the  colonists  and  the  home  subjects,  by  enacting, 
in  1663,  that  "no  commodity  of  the  growth,  production  or 
manufacture  of  Europe,  shall  be  imported  into  the  British 
plantations  but  such  as  are  laden  and  put  on  board  in 
England,  Wales,  or  Berwick-upon-Tweed,"  and  in  English- 
built  shipping  with  an  English  crew. 

The  export  trade  of  the  colonies  was  to  be  restricted 
for  the  benefit  of  the  merchants  of  England;  so  also  was 
this  import  trade.  Whether  so  intended  or  not,  the  restric- 
tions resulted  in  a  lowering  of  the  prices  of  the  colonial 
enumerated  products  when  sent  to  England,  because  the 
market  was  glutted.  At  the  same  time  the  prices  of  the 
European  products,  which  the  colonist  wished  to  buy, 
were,  with  few  exceptions,  greatly  enhanced.  The  colo- 
nial producer  was  robbed  by  the  artificial  reduction  of  the 
selling  price  of  his  products,  and  the  artificial  increase 
of  the  price  he  paid  for  his  European  goods  —  robbed 
twice  by  arbitrary  laws. 

In  1672  Parliament  passed  another  act  still  further 
to  increase  the  "  correspondence  and  kindness"  existing 
between  the  colonials  and  the  subjects  living  in  the  mother- 
country.  A  heavy  tax  was  laid  upon  the  commerce  be- 
tween the  colonics. 

"By  these  successive  regulations,"  says  Robertson, 
"the  plan  of  securing  to  England  a  monopoly  of  its  colo- 
nics .  .  .  was  perfected." 

It  should  now  be  interesting  to  note  the  actual   in- 


44   THE  STORY  OF  THE  MERCHANT  MARINE 

flucnce  of  all  this  legislation  upon  the  colonial  merchant 
marine.  On  July  4,  1631,  Massachusetts  had  launched 
her  first  ship,  a  vessel  of  30  tons.  In  1676  Randolph  re- 
ported that  her  people  owned  30  ships  of  from  100  to 
250  tons'  burden,  200  of  from  50  to  100  tons,  200  of  from 
30  to  50  tons,  and  300  of  from  6  to  10  tons,  the  latter  being 
chiefly  fishing  smacks,  though  some  were  engaged  in  the 
coasting  trade.  The  colony  owned  430  vessels  as  large 
or  larger  than  the  Blessing  of  the  Bay.  Many  ships 
were  also  owned  in  the  other  New  England  colonies.  In 
1678  New  York  owned  "5  smale  ships  and  a  Ketch" 
that  were  in  the  coasting  trade. 

Sir  Josiah  Child,  a  notable  Englishman  engaged  in  the 
trade  with  America,  said,  in  a  book  which  he  wrote  on 
commercial  matters :  — 

"  Of  all  the  American  plantations  his  Majesty  has  none 
so  apt  for  building  of  shipping  as  New  England,  nor  any 
comparably  so  qualified  for  the  breeding  of  seamen,  not 
only  by  reason  of  the  natural  industry  of  that  people, 
but  principally  by  reason  of  their  cod  and  mackerel 
fisheries."  And  to  this  he  adds  a  statement  which  for  the 
first  time  gave  expression  to  what  has  since  been  known 
as  the  "American  Peril."  He  said,  "And,  in  my  poor 
opinion,  there  is  nothing  more  prejudicial  and  in  prospect 
more  dangerous  to  any  mother  kingdom  than  the  increase 
of  shipping  in  her  colonies." 

All  this  is  to  say  that  while  Parliament  had  passed 
three  acts  that  were  confessedly  intended  to  prohibit  a 


THE   SMUGGLER   AND   THE   PIRATE  45 

part,  and  hamper  all  of  the  colonial  trade,  except  that 
with  the  mother-country;  and  while  these  acts  had  proved 
injurious  and  vexatious  to  the  colonial  producers  and 
merchants,  the  colonial  shipping,  the  merchant  marine, 
had  had  such  a  vigorous  growth  that  it  was  alarming  the 
ship-owners  who  lived  in  England. 

This  condition  of  affairs  becomes  all  the  more  inter- 
esting when  it  is  remembered  that  a  restriction  of  colonial 
trade  was  likely  to  affect  colonial  shipping  indirectly,  at 
any  rate;  that  is,  through  a  reduction  in  the  amount  of 
cargo  to  be  carried.  This  injury  was  sure  to  appear  in 
any  reduction  of  trade  between  the  colonies,  and  it  was 
certain  to  affect  the  ships  trading  on  owner's  account  first 
of  all. 

One  easily  finds  a  variety  of  reasons  why  colonial 
shipping  had  grown  so  rapidly  in  spite  of  legislation  ad- 
verse to  trade.  For  one  thing,  good  ships  were  built  in 
New  England  for  £4  per  ton  burden  —  carrying  capacity ; 
the  cost  in  England  was  higher.  Charnock  says  it  was  a 
little  less  than  £6  there,  while  Sir  Josiah  Child  says  it 
was  from  £'/  to  ;^8.  Whatever  the  difference,  it  is  a 
memorable  fact  that  the  mechanics  in  New  England  re- 
ceived higher  wages  than  those  in  the  old  country. 

Naturally  many  merchants  of  England  bought  colony- 
built  ships,  and  this  proved  beneficial  indirectly  to  all 
colonial  shipping.  The  New  England  shipyards  were 
full  of  orders  the  year  round.  The  percentage  of  the  in- 
habitants engaged  in  building  ships  and  in  supplying  the 


46      THE   STORY   OF   THE   MERCHANT   MARINE 

ships'  builders  with  forest  and  farm  products  was  there- 
fore very  large.  These  forest  and  farm  owners,  as  well  as 
the  shipyard  hands  and  the  crews  of  colonial  vessels,  helped 
to  cultivate  the  sea  habit  among  all  the  people.  Then 
the  farms  were  all  within  driving  distance  of  navigable 
water;  all  farm  surplus  exported,  either  abroad  or  to 
other  colonies,  went  in  ships,  and  the  farmer  from  the 
most  remote  plantation  was  not  unlikely  to  see  his  produce 
loaded  upon  a  ship  of  some  kind.  In  fact,  many  a  man 
behind  the  plough  could  "hand,  reef  and  steer." 

Reference  has  already  been  made  to  the  resourcefulness 
of  the  American  seaman  of  the  period,  but  it  may  be  said 
again  that  the  manner  of  life  of  the  people  —  the  fact  that 
"  even  at  the  end  of  the  colonial  period  the  average  Ameri- 
can led  a  life  of  struggling  and  privation"  —  made  Ameri- 
can crews  the  most  efficient  in  the  world.  Captain  John 
Gallop,  in  a  sloop  of  twenty  tons,  manned  by  two  men 
and  two  boys,  was,  in  1636,  not  only  able  to  take  care  of 
his  vessel  in  a  gale  of  wind  but  to  retake  another  sloop 
that  had  been  captured  by  the  Indians.  Many  vessels 
traded  to  the  West  Indies  with  but  five  men  and  a  boy  on 
board.  Raleigh  had  mourned  because  Dutch  ships,  in 
his  day,  needed  no  more  than  half  as  many  sailors  as 
English  ships,  but  in  1676  the  New  England  ships  needed 
less  than  the  Dutch  or  any  other  ships.  It  was  when 
contemplating  a  New  England  ship  manned  by  a  New 
England  crew  that  Sir  Josiah  Child  discovered  the 
"American  Peril."    He  saw  that  a  colonial  ship  manned 


THE   SMUGGLER   AND   THE   PIRATE  47 

by  a  colonial  crew  was  more  efficient  than  the  same  ship 
manned  by  any  other  crew,  and  that  is  a  most  important 
fact  in  this  story. 

A  most  interesting  cause  of  the  growth  of  the  colonial 
merchant  marine  is  found  in  the  bounties  which  the  navi- 
gation laws  offered  to,  and  the  facilities  they  provided  for, 
those  who  would  engage  in  clandestine  trade.  It  was 
unlawful  to  carry  tobacco  from  the  colonies  direct  to  a 
foreign  port,  but  the  export  of  fish  and  staves  was  per- 
mitted. Importations  of  salt  were  permitted,  but  Spanish 
iron  must  be  purchased  in  England  at  a  time  when  Spanish 
iron  was  the  best  in  the  world  for  ship-builder's  use.  The 
restriction  on  tobacco  lowered  the  price  in  the  colonies; 
that  on  the  iron  raised  the  price  there.  If  tobacco  were 
clandestinely  exported  direct  to  Spain  and  iron  brought 
directly  home,  the  ship  made  far  greater  profits  than  in 
the  days  before  the  hated  laws.  Moreover,  the  smuggled 
cargo  paid  no  tariff-for-revenue  dues  or  port  charges. 
And  it  was  easy  to  smuggle  in  any  kind  of  a  cargo. 

In  connection  with  this  provision  of  a  bounty  on  smug- 
gling, consider  the  influence  of  the  fact  that  the  laws  were 
intentionally  unfair  to  the  colonists.  The  colonists  re- 
sented the  injustice,  and  all  the  more  because  their  trade 
previous  to  the  enactment  of  the  laws  had  been  free. 
Then  the  conditions  under  which  the  laws  were  enforced 
were  inquisitorial  and  otherwise  vexatious.  A  time  came 
when  forts  were  built  and  revenue  cutters  were  provided 
for  the  enforcing  of  the  laws,  and  the  officials  of  forts 


48       THE   STORY   OF   THE   MERCHANT   MARINE 

and  cutters  were  insolent  and  overanxious  to  confiscate 
accused  ships. 

Recall,  now,  the  mental  attitude  of  the  colonists  toward 
all  authority.  Some  had  emigrated  from  England  to 
escape  religious  tyranny.  Many  had  come  over  as  in- 
dentured servants,  looking  fonvard  to  a  time  when  they 
should  be  free,  and  become  men  of  influence.  Then  all 
the  conditions  of  colonial  life,  and  especially  its  dangers, 
cultivated  a  feeling  of  manly  independence  of  all  authority. 
Finally,  the  colonists  had  from  the  first  made  at  least  their 
local  laws  according  to  their  own  standards  of  right. 

"It  is  not  unknown  to  you  that  they  look  upon  them- 
selves as  a  free  State  .  .  .  there  being  many  against 
owning  the  King,  or  having  any  dependence  on  Engld." 
(Letter  dated  March  ii,  1660.) 

In  short,  the  colonists  had  been  rapidly  developing  the 
American  habit  of  doing  what  they  happened  to  believe 
to  be  right,  regardless  of  the  law  in  the  case,  and  they 
called,  or  were  to  call,  this  habit  an  appeal  to  the  "higher 
law." 

Inspired  by  honest  indignation  and  an  opportunity 
to  increase  their  profits,  the  colonial  ship-owners  and 
crews,  with  much  unanimity,  appealed  to  the  "higher  law," 

Smuggling  began  as  soon  as  attempts  were  made  to 
enforce  the  law.  It  was  estimated  that  the  losses  to  the 
British  revenue  through  the  direct  sale  of  tobacco  to  the 
Dutch  at  Manhattan  Island  previous  to  the  year  1664 
amounted  to  ;/(^io,ooo  a  year.     When,  in  1665,  the  king  took 


THE    SMUGGLER   AND   THE   PIRATE  49 

notice  of  colonial  dereliction,  by  issuing  instructions  for  a 
strict  enforcement  of  the  laws,  the  General  Court  of  Mas- 
sachusetts replied  that  they  were  not  conscious  of  having 
"greatly  violated"  them.  In  1776  Edward  Randolph 
was  sent  over  especially  "Impowered"  to  prevent  "Ir- 
regular Trade,"  and  the  letters  he  wrote  to  the  "Lords 
Commissioners  of  the  Council  of  Trade  and  Plantations"^ 
are  full  of  references  to  the  ways  of  the  smugglers.  Other 
letters  of  the  period,  especially  those  of  Governor  Bello- 
mont,  are  similarly  interesting. 

At  first  the  evasions  were  quite  open.  It  is  related  that 
Skipper  Claes  Bret  loaded  the  ship  De  Sterre  in  the  Chesa- 
peake "in  the  name  of  an  English  skipper,"  and  sent  her 
to  the  Island  of  Jersey.  Virginia  officials  must  have 
aided  this  transaction.  Weeden  quotes  from  the  Mas- 
sachusetts archives  the  story  of  another  Dutch  skipper 
whose  ship  was  seized  because  he  "broake  his  word  to 
the  Governor  in  not  clearing  his  ship  to  belong  to  the 
English."  Governor  Andros,  who  tried  to  enforce  the 
laws,  complained  because  there  were  "noe  Custom  houses," 
and  because  the  "  Governor  of  Massachusetts  gives  clear- 
ings, certificates  and  passes  for  every  particular  thing  from 
thence  to  New  York"  without  inquiring  whether  these 
things  had  been  lawfully  imported  into  Massachusetts. 

The  king's  instructions  to  Governor  Dongan  tell  him 

^  This  board  was  created  by  an  Order  in  Council  dated  July  4  (no- 
where mentioned  as  "a  beautiful  coincidence  "  ),  1660,  "  to  receive,  hear, 
examine  and  deliberate  "  upon  all  matters  concerning  the  colonies,  and 
report  the  facts  and  their  conclusions  to  the  king. 
K 


50       THE    STORY   OF   THE    MERCHANT   MARINE 

how  "to  prevent  the  acceptance  of  forged  Cockets  (which 
hath  been  practiced  to  our  great  prejudice)."  A  cocket  is 
a  document  given  by  a  customs  officer  to  a  merchant  as  a 
certificate  that  the  goods  have  been  entered  according  to 
law.  Randolph  reported  (April,  1698)  that  he  had  asked 
the  Governor  of  Pennsylvania  "to  appoint  an  Attorney 
Generall  to  prosecute"  certain  men  who  had  aided  in  an 
evasion  of  the  laws,  "but  he  did  nothing  in  it."  In  the 
same  year  Randolph  was  arrested  in  New  York  by  ag- 
grieved merchants  because  he  had,  as  he  alleges,  seized  a 
smuggler  in  Virginia,  and  although  his  case  seems  now  to 
have  been  according  to  law.  Governor  Bellomont  had  much 
difficulty  in  getting  him  out  of  jail.  No  one  sympathized 
with  a  revenue  official. 

Before  Bellomont's  time  no  official  except  Governor  An- 
dros  had  tried  to  enforce  the  navigation  acts.  When  Bello- 
mont took  office,  he  found  all  New  York  opposing  him  in  his 
efforts  to  enforce  them.  When  the  ship  Fortune,  Cap- 
tain Thomas  Moston,  came  to  port,  bringing  cargo  worth 
;^20,ooo  direct  from  Madagascar  (where  it  had  been  pur- 
chased of  a  gang  of  pirates),  and  Bellomont  asked  Col- 
lector of  Customs  Chidley  Brooks  to  seize  her,  he  replied 
that  "  it  was  none  of  his  business,  but  belonged  to  a  Man  of 
Warr;  that  he  had  no  boat ;  and  other  excuses ;  and  when 
I  gave  him  positive  commands  to  do  it,  which  he  could  not 
avoid,  yet  his  delay  of  four  days"  gave  the  smugglers  time 
to  unload  and  conceal  all  of  the  cargo  except  a  part  esti- 
mated to  be  worth  ;^iooo.     Thus  runs  one  of  Bellomont's 


THE   SMUGGLER   AND   THE   PIRATE  51 

letters.  He  also  acknowledged  that  several  cargoes  had 
already  been  smuggled  in  without  his  learning  the  fact  until 
it  was  too  late  to  intercept  them. 

In  Boston,  as  Bellomont  learned,  there  were  various  ways 
of  smuggling.  "  When  ships  come  in  the  masters  swear  to 
their  manifests ;  that  is,  they  swear  to  the  number  of  parcels 
they  bring,  but  the  contents  unknown ;  then  the  merchant 
comes  and  produces  an  invoice,  and  whether  true  or  false 
is  left  to  his  ingenuity." 

"If  the  merchants  of  Boston  be  minded  to  run  their 
goods,"  he  continues,  "there's  nothing  to  hinder  them. 
Mr.  Brenton,  the  Collector  is  absent  and  has  been  these  two 
years;  his  deputy  is  a  merchant;  the  two  waiters  keep 
public  houses,  and  besides  that,  that  coast  is  naturall 
shap'd  and  cut  out  to  favour  unlawful  trade."  It  was  a 
"common  thing  to  unload  their  ships  at  Cape  Ann  and 
bring  their  goods  to  Boston  in  wood  boats."  If  that  were 
thought  too  expensive  the  goods  could  be  "run"  within  the 
city,  where  there  were  "63  wharfs,"  or  in  Charlestown, 
where  there  were  fourteen  more,  all  unguarded.  French 
and  Spanish  ships  were  bringing  many  goods  to  New- 
foundland and  the  ports  of  Canada,  where  they  met 
New  England  ships  ready  to  "swap"  cargoes.  There 
was  lively  trade  carried  directly  to  the  ports  of  Canada 
and  to  the  French  and  Spanish  ports  of  the  West 
Indies. 

After  returning  to  New  York  from  Boston,  Bellomont 
wrote  that  "Nassaw  alias  Long  Island"  was  notorious  for 


52       THE   STORY   OF  THE   MERCHANT   MARINE 

smugglers  and  pirates.  "There  are  four  towns  that  make 
it  their  daily  practice  to  receive  ships  and  sloops  with  all 
sorts  of  merchandise,  tho'  they  be  not  allowed  ports." 
They  were  "so  lawless  and  desperate  a  people"  that 
the  governor  could  "get  no  honest  man"  to  go  among 
them  to  collect  the  revenue.  From  Long  Island  the  goods 
were  brought  to  New  York  by  wagons  and  small  boats. 
"There  is  a  town  called  Stamford  in  Connecticut  colony" 
where  "one  Major  Selleck  lives  who  has  a  warehouse 
close  to  the  Sound.  .  .  .  That  man  does  us  great  mis- 
chief with  his  warehouse  for  he  receives  abundance  of 
goods,  and  the  merchants  afterwards  take  their  oppor- 
tunity of  running  them  into  this  town."  During  Bello- 
mont's  time  Selleck's  warehouse  was  the  favorite  resort 
of  the  merchants  doing  business  with  the  IMadagascar 
pirates.  Selleck  had  ;^io,ooo  worth  of  the  goods  which 
Captain  Kidd  brought  from  the  East. 

Turning  now  to  the  stories  of  the  pirates,  we  read  that 
when  one  Captain  Cromwell,  a  pirate  with  three  ships, 
manned  by  eighty  men,  came  to  Plymouth  in  1646,  and 
remained  five  or  six  weeks  with  the  Pilgrims,  Governor 
Bradley  referred  to  the  visit  in  these  words :  — 

"  They  spente  and  scattered  a  great  deal  of  money  among 
ye  people,  and  yet  more,  sine,  than  money." 

The  statement  that  the  Pilgrims  (of  all  others !)  en- 
tertained the  pirates  so  well  as  to  detain  them  for  weeks 
in  the  harbor  is  somewhat  shocking  to  one  not  fully  ac- 
quainted with  the  conditions  of  commerce  in  that  period. 


THE    SMUGGLER   AND   THE   PIRATE  53 

The  facts  regarding  the  pirates  seem  worth,  therefore, 
some  consideration. 

While  pirates  were  found  upon  the  ocean  as  soon  as  other 
ships  in  the  early  history  of  the  world,  some  of  the  piracy 
affecting  the  early  commerce  of  the  colonies  grew  out  of  a 
curious  system  of  private  reprisals  that  was  previously 
countenanced  by  European  governments.  Thus,  when 
the  Inquisition  in  the  Canary  Islands  seized  the  property 
of  Andrew  Barker,  an  Englishman,  in  1576,  and  he  was 
unable  to  obtain  redress  from  any  Spanish  authority,  he, 
with  the  permission  of  his  government,  "fitted  out  two 
barks  to  revenge  himself."  He  captured  enough  Spanish 
merchantmen  to  recoup  his  loss  with  interest.  His  com- 
mission was  called  a  letter  of  marque  and  reprisal. 

Then  recall  the  system  of  forcing  trade  that  was  practised 
in  the  West  Indies.  Sir  John  Hawkins  sold  slaves  to  the 
Spanish  at  the  muzzles  of  his  guns.  Eventually  Sir 
John's  fleet  was  "bottled  up"  in  Vera  Cruz  by  a  Spanish 
squadron  and  destroyed.  Drake  was  one  of  the  men 
ruined  by  this  act  of  Spanish  "perfidy,"  and  to  recoup  his 
losses  he  began  the  series  of  raids  by  which  he  acquired 
fortune  and  a  title. 

Reprisals  led  to  wanton  aggressions,  like  those  of  the 
buccaneers,  and  wanton  aggressions  produced  reprisals 
again.  All  governments  encouraged  their  merchantmen 
to  rob  those  of  rival  peoples  as  a  means  of  promoting  com- 
merce, just  as  the  warring  fur  traders  on  the  American  fron- 
tier were  encouraged  in  their  fights  waged  to  the  same  end. 


54       THE   STORY   OF   THE   MERCHANT   MARINE 

The  encouragement  of  reprisals  was  at  all  times  more  or 
less  covert.  In  war  times  the  armed  merchantmen  were 
openly  commissioned  and  sent  afloat  not  only  to  prey  upon 
the  ships  of  the  enemy  but  upon  those  of  neutral  powers 
as  well.  It  was  the  theory  of  all  statesmen  that  the  best 
way  to  encourage  the  shipping  of  one  nation  was  to  injure 
as  much  as  possible,  and  by  all  means,  the  shipping  of  all 
rivals.  As  late  as  the  end  of  the  eighteenth  century  the 
Barbary  pirates  were  subsidized  by  some  governments  to 
encourage  them  to  prey  upon  the  shipping  of  rivals. 

At  one  time  the  privateer  captain  was  the  judge  of  the 
offending  of  the  neutral.  Later,  when  privateers  were 
obliged  to  carry  captured  ships  before  a  court  of  admiralty, 
the  difference  between  the  robbery  as  committed  by  the 
privateer  and  the  confiscation  ordered  by  the  court  was 
found  only  in  the  course  of  procedure. 

A  theorist  here  and  there  denounced  the  systems  of 
reprisals  and  privateering.  Governor  Bradford  was  wor- 
ried somewhat  by  the  doings  of  Cromwell's  men.  Gov- 
ernment officials  denounced  as  pirates  the  privateers  who 
smuggled  in  goods  instead  of  bringing  them  in  openly  and 
paying  the  usual  fees  and  duties.  But  the  state  of  civiliza- 
tion warranted  the  Pilgrims  in  the  warmth  of  the  reception 
they  gave  to  the  pirates. 

How  far  the  piratical  cruisers  influenced  the  American 
merchant  marine  is  not  definitely  told  in  the  documents, 
but  it  is  certain  that  damage  was  inflicted.  We  get  a 
glimpse  of  a  vicious  raid  in  the  story  of  a  French  pirate 


THE   SMUGGLER  AND   THE   PIRATE  55 

(perhaps  he  had  a  commission,  however)  named  Picor, 
who  landed  on  Block  Island  in  July,  1689.  The  pirates  "  re- 
mained in  possession  of  the  island,  plundering  the  houses, 
and  despoiling  it  of  every  moveable  thing,"  for  a  week. 
Two  of  the  islanders  were  tortured  to  make  them  reveal  the 
hiding-place  of  valuables,  and  two  negroes  were  killed. 

From  the  island  the  pirates  went  to  New  London,  but 
they  were  driven  away.  On  sailing  toward  the  open  sea 
once  more,  they  were  intercepted  by  two  armed  sloops 
that  had  been  sent  out  from  Newport  under  one  Captain 
Paine.  A  Naval  History  of  Rhode  Island  says  that  Paine 
had  "followed  the  privateering  design"  in  former  years 
as  a  lieutenant  under  Picor,  and  that  the  Frenchman,  on 
recognizing  him,  fled,  saying  he  "would  as  soon  fight  the 
devil  as  Paine." 

In  the  Canadian  Archives  (1894)  are  two  stories  of 
raids  upon  French  possessions,  made  in  one  case  by 
"Englishmen"  (they  took  Quebec),  and  in  the  other 
by  "the  people  of  Massachusetts." 

Many  letters  charging  various  colonies  with  encourag- 
ing pirates  are  found  in  the  old  documents.  Rhode  Island, 
New  York,  and  the  two  Carolinaswere  accused  in  this  way 
more  frequently  than  the  others,  and  New  York  was  the 
chief  offender  in  the  days  of  Governor  Benjamin  Fletcher 
(1692-1697).  While  the  buccaneers  were  ravaging  the 
Spanish  mainland,  another  horde  found  opportunity  in 
the  conditions  prevailing  on  the  coast  of  Asia.  These 
latter  pirates  formed  a  settlement  upon  Madagascar  Island, 


56      THE   STORY  OF   THE   MERCHANT   MARINE 

wherein  gold  and  jewels  were  abundant,  but  such  products 
of  civilization  as  rum  and  weapons  were  scarce  and  much 
wanted.  New  York  merchants  usually  supplied  these 
wants,  but  New  Englanders  sent  them  at  least  one  cargo  of 
masts  and  yards  for  their  ships.  The  merchant  captains 
engaged  in  this  supply  trade  also  took  a  turn  at  piracy  when- 
ever opportunity  offered.  Governor  Fletcher  did  a  thriv- 
ing business  in  supplying  captains  with  commissions  when 
they  sailed,  and  "protections"  when  they  returned.  Cap- 
tain Edward  Coates,  of  the  ship  Jacob,  said  that  he  paid 
;i^i300  for  "his  share"  of  the  price  of  the  commission  with 
which  the  ship  sailed.  At  the  end  of  the  voyage  the 
crew  "shared  the  value  of  1800  pieces  of  eight,  a  man." 
Fletcher  took  the  ship,  valued  at  ;^8oo,  for  his  bribe  when 
he  allowed  Coates  to  land  the  cargo.  The  sailors  had  to 
pay  the  governor  from  seventy-five  to  one  hundred  pieces 
of  eight  for  "protections." 

Captain  Giles  Shelly,  of  the  ship  Nassau,  carried  rum 
which  cost  two  shillings  a  gallon  to  Madagascar,  and  sold  it 
for  from  fifty  shillings  to  three  pounds  a  gallon.  "A  pipe 
of  Madeira  wine  which  cost  him  ;^i9  he  sold  for  ;i^300." 

Captain  William  Kidd  was  the  most  notorious  of  the 
captains  engaged  in  the  Madagascar  trade,  but  the  story 
of  his  career  is  interesting  chiefly  because  of  the  light  it 
throws  upon  the  state  of  civilization  then  prevailing.  His 
troubles  began  when  Lord  Bellomont  and  some  other 
noble  lords  of  England  fitted  out  a  private  armed  ship  to  go 
to  Madagascar  and  rob  the  pirates.     Bellomont  describes 


THE   SMUGGLER  AND   THE   PIRATE  57 

this  venture  as  "very  honest."  Kidd  was  chosen  to  com- 
mand the  ship  —  The  Adventure  Galley.  On  arriving  at 
Madagascar,  he  found  that  the  pirates  had  a  stronger  ship 
than  his,  and  he  was  afraid  to  attack  them.  The  crew  had 
been  shipped  on  the  usual  privateer  plan  of  no  prize,  no 
pay,  and  on  finding  they  were  to  get  no  prize  they  became 
mutinous.  Many  of  them  deserted  to  the  pirates  of  the 
island.  In  a  half-hearted  effort  to  maintain  discipline 
among  those  remaining,  Kidd  hit  a  man  with  a  bucket  and 
happened  to  kill  him.  Then  he  went  cruising,  pirate  fash- 
ion, and  captured  a  ship  belonging  to  "the  Moors,"  which 
was  valued  at  ;^30,ooo.  In  this  ship  Kidd  sailed  for  home. 
He  learned,  on  the  way,  that  he  had  been  proclaimed  as  a 
pirate.  Bellomont  had  been  accused  by  political  enemies 
in  Parliament  of  fitting  out  a  piratical  cruiser,  and  being 
unwilling  to  face  the  charge  by  telling  the  facts  frankly,  he 
shuffled,  told  falsehoods,  and  eventually  made  a  scapegoat 
of  Kidd,  who  was  hanged  (May  12,  1701). 

That  this  man,  who  at  worst  had  killed  one  man  in  a 
sea  brawl,  and  had  taken  one  ship,  should  have  had  ballads 
written  about  him  in  which  he  was  described  as  "bloody" 
is  one  of  the  most  remarkable  facts  in  the  history  of  the  sea. 
But  that  he  should  have  been  referred  to  ever  since  in  all 
literature  as  a  typical  pirate  is  still  more  remarkable. 

A  book,  Hughson's  Carolina  Pirates  and  Colonial  Com- 
merce, has  been  written  to  tell  about  the  deeds  of  such  men 
as  Bane,  Stede  Bonnet,  Moody,  and  Edward  Thatch,  or 
Blackbeard,  but  it  has  little  to  say  about  the  influence  of 


58       THE   STORY  OF  THE   MERCHANT  MARINE 

the  pirates  upon  commerce,  because  there  is  little  to  say. 
The  pirates  mentioned  captured  a  few  ships,  American  as 
well  as  English,  and  for  brief  periods  interrupted  the  trade 
of  various  ports.  On  the  other  hand,  some  of  them  supplied 
the  colonists  with  low-priced  goods,  and  at  times  the  only 
coin  in  circulation  was  that  brought  in  by  the  freebooters. 
On  the  whole,  in  a  financial  point  of  view,  the  pirates  bene- 
fited the  young  merchant  marine  more  than  they  damaged 
it.  In  anticipation  of  attacks  by  pirates,  all  ships  in  deep- 
water  trade  carried  cannon,  and  some  coasters  did  so, 
especially  in  the  longer  voyages.  In  the  trade  with  Spain 
and  Portugal  and  the  Canary  Islands  the  American  vessels 
were  often  chased,  and  sometimes  captured,  by  Barbary 
pirates  who  had  learned  their  trade  from  European  rene- 
gades. New  England  ships  in  the  West  Indies  were 
always  obliged  to  keep  a  sharp  lookout  for  piratical  cruis- 
ers under  French  and  Spanish  flags.  But  these  aggres- 
sions were  not  an  unmixed  evil.  For  such  conditions  in- 
creased freight  rates  and  the  profits  on  cargoes  carried  on 
owners'  account.  Thus  the  freight  rate  from  Boston  to 
Barbados,  in  1762,  was  "14  per  ton  or  four  times  former 
rates,"  and  all  because  of  pirates.  Sure  fortune  came  to 
the  ship  captain  who  was  equal  to  the  emergencies  of  the 
trade.  Dangers  cultivated  the  courage  and  enterprise  of 
the  crews.  In  a  still  broader  view  the  habits  of  a  people 
soon  to  become  an  independent  nation  were  forming,  and  it 
was  well  worth  while  for  some  of  them  to  learn  how  to 
swim  in  rough  water. 


CHAPTER  IV 

BEFORE  THE  WAR  OF  THE  REVOLUTION 

TWO  of  the  trades  in  which  the  ships  of  the  Ameri- 
can colonies  were  largely  engaged  during  the 
seventeenth  century  are  of  special  interest  here 
—  the  whale  fishery  and  the  slave  trade.  It  was  in  17 12 
that  Captain  Christopher  Hussey,  while  off  Nantucket,  in  an 
open  boat,  looking  for  whales,  was  blown  away  to  sea,  where 
he  killed  a  sperm  whale,  the  profitable  sale  of  which  led  the 
people  of  his  famous  home  island  to  go  cruising  in  deep 
water  for  more  whales  of  the  kind.  The  growth  of  the  fish- 
ery that  followed  was  swift.  In  1730  Nantucket  alone  had 
twenty-five  deep-water  whalers,  and  they  brought  home  oil 
and  bone  that  sold  for  ;^32oo.  In  the  meantime  the  isl- 
anders had  begun  sending  their  products  directly  to  Lon- 
don, thus  establishing  a  new  line  of  trade.  With  the  in- 
crease of  profits  came  an  extension  of  the  territory  where 
the  search  for  whales  was  made.  In  1751  they  went  to 
Disco  Island  in  the  mouth  of  Baffin's  Bay.  In  1763  they 
were  found  on  the  coast  of  Guinea  (looking  for  whales  and 
ignoring  the  slave  trade),  and  that,  too,  in  spite  of  the  wars 
that  had  covered  the  seas  with  pirates.  In  1767  no  less 
than  fifty  whalers  crossed  the  equator  "by  way  of  experi- 

59 


6o      THE   STORY   OF   THE   MERCHANT  MARINE 

mcnt."  That  statement  is  perhaps  the  most  significant  of 
any  that  can  be  made  of  the  fishery.  Nantucket  alone 
owned  125  whalers  in  1770;  they  were, on  the  average,  93 
tons'  burden  in  size,  and  in  the  course  of  the  year  they 
brought  home  14,331  barrels  of  oil  worth  $358,200  as  soon 
as  landed. 

These  facts  are  of  special  interest  to  the  story  of  the 
American  merchant  marine  for  several  reasons.  The  oil 
and  bone  formed  an  important  part  of  what  a  farmer 
might  call  the  cash  crops  of  the  nation.  Then  the 
whalers  were  producers  whose  work  added  to  the  com- 
fort and  prosperity  of  the  world.  Travellers  from  Europe 
were  astonished  to  learn  that  America  was  a  land  where  "  no 
one  begged."  Nantucket  was  a  community  not  only  where 
no  one  begged  but  where  every  man  was  a  capitalist,  or  at 
worst  had  capital  within  reach.  For  every  man  went 
whaling,  or  might  do  so,  and  a  "greasy"  voyage  made 
every  member  of  the  ship's  crew  rich  enough  to  buy  shares 
in  a  whale  ship.  The  "lay"  of  the  whale  ship  was  like 
the  private  venture  of  the  freighter.  Further  than  that 
the  whaler  carried  a  number  of  petty  officers  found  on  no 
other  kind  of  a  ship — the  "boatsteerers."  The  ambitious 
youth  before  the  mast  found  promotion  nearer  at  hand. 
Many  a  youth  who  went  afloat  as  a  "  greenhorn  "  re- 
turned proudly  wearing  the  badge  of  the  boatsteerer.  It 
was  a  matter  of  no  small  importance  in  a  country  wherein 
were  many  bond-servants  looking  forward  to  freedom  and 
an  opportunity  to  rise  in  the  world. 


BEFORE  THE  WAR  OF  THE  REVOLUTION   6i 

More  important  still  was  the  influence  of  the  adventures 
enjoyed  and  dangers  risked  by  the  whalers.  Wherever 
whale-oil  was  burned,  men  were  found  telling  the  tales  of 
the  sea.  The  people  who  listened  were  peculiarly  sus- 
ceptible, for  they  had  come  across  the  sea,  looking  for  new 
lands  and  opportunities,  or  they  were  the  immediate  de- 
scendants of  those  who  had  done  so.  When  Captain  Shields 
led  the  way  around  Cape  Horn,  he  not  only  aroused  a  spirit 
of  emulation  in  all  other  whalers,  but  he  inspired  a  whole 
people.  As  they  listened  to  the  story  the  people  of  the 
interior  were  reminded  that  the  streams  before  their  doors 
were  dimpling  highways  to  the  sea  and  the  wonder  world 
beyond  its  borders;  and  there  were  no  other  highways 
worth  mention  in  the  country  in  those  days.^ 

In  every  story  of  the  slave  trade  one  must  remember  that 
modem  readers  are  able  only  with  great  difficulty  to 
obtain  the  right  point  of  view. 

We  err  greatly  in  judging  the  people  of  the  seventeenth 
century  by  the  standards  of  the  twentieth.  There  was 
work  to  do  —  the  world's  work  —  and  many  of  the  workers, 
though  they  saw  dimly,  or  not  at  all,  the  task  in  hand,  were 
so  eager  to  do  their  share  of  it  that  they  voluntarily  sold 
themselves  into  bondage  in  order  to  go  about  it.  Were  such 
men  as  these,  or  their  contemporaries,  likely  to  see  any- 
thing wrong  in  compelling  the  less  developed  but  strong- 
armed  Africans  to  take  hold  and  "keep  the  ball  rolling  "? 

*  The  Story  of  New  England  Whalers  gives  a  satisfactory  history  of  the 
American  whale  fishery. 


62       THE   STORY  OF   THE   MERCHANT   MARINE 

Manifestly,  slavery  was  an  unavoidable  feature  of  the  evo- 
lution of  the  race,  and  the  slave-owners  of  yesterday  were  as 
well  justified  in  their  belief  that  slavery  was  just,  as  we  are 
in  our  belief  that  the  able  financier  —  the  good  business 
man  —  is  entitled  to  a  much  greater  share  of  the  good 
things  of  life  than  a  man  of  different  mental  caliber  —  say 
a  college  professor,  for  example. 

The  traffic  in  slaves  followed  immediately  upon  de- 
mand.    Says  Winthrop's  Journal :  — 

"  One  of  our  ships  which  went  to  the  Canaries  with  pipe- 
staves  in  the  beginning  of  November  last,  [1644]  returned 
now  and  brought  wine,  and  sugar  and  salt  and  some  to- 
bacco which  she  had  at  Barbadoes  in  exchange  for  Africans 
which  she  carried  from  the  Isle  of  Maio." 

The  Desire,  with  her  slaves  from  Providence,  was  the 
first  American  slaver,  but  long  before  the  end  of  the  seven- 
teenth century  the  colonial  ships  trading  to  the  Madeiras 
and  Canaries  made  a  regular  practice  of  slaving.  For  the 
wine  and  salt  which  were  obtained  in  the  islands  were  not  of 
sufficient  bulk  to  fill  the  holds  of  their  ships.  The  enter- 
prising captains  wanted  to  make  use  of  the  vacant  space 
between  cargo  and  deck,  and  nothing  they  could  find  for 
that  purpose  would  yield  as  much  profit  as  negro  slaves 
bought  on  the  coast  of  Africa,  and  carried  to  the  one-crop 
colonies  like  Barbados  and  Virginia. 

It  is  true  that  when  the  captain  of  a  Massachusetts  ship 
helped  to  raid  an  African  village,  and  thus,  by  assault,  cap- 
tured two  slaves,  the  General  Court  ordered  them  returned 


BEFORE  THE  WAR  OF  THE  REVOLUTION   63 

to  Africa.  But  in  deciding  the  questions  arising  in  this 
case  the  Court  distinctly,  if  indirectly,  affirmed  the  doctrine 
that  slaves  were  property:  "For  the  negroes,  (they  being 
none  of  his  but  stolen),  we  think  meete  to  alowe  nothing." 
If  he  had  obtained  them  by  purchase,  the  Court  would  have 
allowed  him  full  value. 

Between  1585  and  1672  inclusive,  six  monopolistic  com- 
panies were  organized  in  England  to  control  the  African 
trade.  Because  of  the  monopolistic  work  of  the  last  one, 
the  people  of  Barbados  declared,  at  first,  that  it  was  "kill- 
ing the  provision  trade  from  New  England."  That  is  to 
say,  that  for  a  time  New  England  ships  were  driven  from 
the  island  trade;  but  the  smugglers  soon  circumvented  the 
monopoly.  "Interlopers"  attempting  to  leave  England 
for  the  slave  trade  were  easily  detained  at  the  request  of  the 
company,  but  American  ships  were  not  to  be  so  detained. 
Then  the  company  appointed  agents  to  intercept  the  car- 
goes brought  to  the  Barbados  ports,  but  all  in  vain, 
"Armed  multitudes  on  foot  and  on  horseback"  attacked  the 
unfortunate  agents  who  tried  to  do  their  duty.  Cargoes 
of  slaves  were  landed  on  the  beach  between  ports  while 
agents  slept.  The  work  of  the  company  simply  increased 
the  profits  of  the  "interlopers." 

When,  in  1698,  Parliament  opened  the  trade  to  all 
merchantmen,  the  increase  of  the  trade  was  considered  "so 
Highly  Beneficial  and  Advantageous  to  this  Kingdom" 
that  efforts  were  made  to  secure  the  slave  traffic  of  the 
Spanish  islands  also,  and  with  success.     The  most  valued 


64      THE   STORY   OF   THE   MERCHANT   MARINE 

feature  of  the  Peace  of  Utrecht  (March  13,  1713)  was  the 
Assiento  by  which  Spain  agreed  to  permit  England  to 
send  not  less  than  4800  slaves  every  year  thereafter  to  the 
Spanish  colonics. 

With  Spanish  as  well  as  all  English  West  India  islands 
open  to  the  trade  of  the  New  England  slavers,  it  is  in- 
teresting to  note  that  one  port  soon  forged  ahead  of  all 
others  in  the  number  of  ships  engaged  in  the  traffic. 
Rhode  Island  merchants  secured  a  much  greater  share  of  it 
than  those  of  other  parts  of  the  coast.  Their  success  ap- 
pears to  have  been  due  in  part  to  geographical  conditions. 
Thus  the  people  of  Massachusetts  led  those  of  Rhode  Isl- 
and in  the  fisheries  because  they  lived  nearer  the  Banks, 
but  they  had  no  advantage  in  carrying  forest  and  farm 
products  to  the  West  Indies.  In  fact,  Newport  was 
measurably  nearer  to  Barbados  than  Boston  was;  her 
ships  did  not  have  to  risk  the  dangers  of  Cape  Cod.  This 
was  a  small  advantage,  but  all  the  more  interesting  on  that 
account.  Boston  gave  her  attention  chiefly  to  fish;  New- 
port perforce  made  a  specialty  of  something  else,  and  of  all 
the  products  of  the  soil  used  in  trade,  within  her  reach, 
there  was  nothing  that  gave  so  large  a  profit  as  molasses, 
when  it  was  the  raw  material  for  the  manufacture  of  rum. 
Newport  thought  to  fish,  at  one  time ;  a  bounty  was  paid 
on  whale-oil  taken  by  ships  of  the  colony.  But  the  pro- 
duction of  rum  needed  no  artificial  stimulation.  Molasses 
cost  thirteen  or  fourteen  pennies  a  gallon,  and  Rhode 
Island  distillers  became  so  expert  that  some  of  them  made 


BEFORE  THE  WAR  OF  THE  REVOLUTION   65 

a  gallon  of  rum  from  one  of  molasses,  though  the  ordinary 
product  was  96  gallons  in  100.  Rum  was  not  only  cheap, 
it  was  satisfying.  Even  the  French  Canadians  bought  rum, 
instead  of  brandy  from  their  native  land. 

Gaining  the  lead  in  the  manufacture  of  rum  gave  the 
Newport  merchants  the  lead  in  the  slave  trade,  for  of  all 
goods  carried  by  enlightened  and  civilized  white  men  to 
the  degraded  heathen  of  Africa  nothing  proved  so  tempting 
as  this  deadly  stupefier. 

Many  stories  of  the  early  slave  trade  remain,  but  none 
shows  the  conditions  as  they  were  better  than  that  of  a 
voyage  made  by  Captain  David  Lindsay,  in  the  40-ton 
brigantine  Sanderson,  belonging  to  William  Johnson  & 
Co.,  of  Newport,  in  1752.  She  sailed  for  the  black  coast 
on  August  22,  at  11.32  o'clock,  the  exact  minute  being 
noted  on  an  astrologer's  chart  which  the  captain  had  ob- 
tained as  a  guide.  The  chief  part  of  her  cargo  consisted 
of  "80  hhds.  six  bbs.  and  3  tierces  of  rum,  containing  8220 
gals."  Lumber  and  staves  for  sale  at  Barbados,  as  well  as 
for  use  in  making  the  slave  deck,  were  also  carried,  but  in 
small  quantities.  A  partial  description  of  the  vessel  before 
sailing  says  she  was  "  tite  as  yet."  In  a  letter  dated  "  Ana- 
maboe  28th  Feb.  1753,"  Captain  Lindsay  reports  prog- 
ress :  — 

"I  have  got  13  or  14  hhds  of  Rum  yet  left  a  board  & 
God  noes  when  I  shall  get  clear  of  it.  Ye  traid  is  so  dull 
it  is  actually  a  noof  to  make  a  man  Creasy."  Officers  and 
men  had  been  sick,  one  was  likely  to  die, "  and  wors  than  yt 

F 


66       THE    STORY   OF   THE   MERCHANT   MARINE 

have  wore  out  my  small  cable  &  have  been  obliged  to  buy 
one  heare.  ...  I  beg  you  not  blaime  me  in  so  doeing. 
I  should  be  glad  I  could  come  rite  home  with  my  slaves  for 
my  vesiel  will  not  last  to  proceed  farr.  We  can  see  day 
Lite  al  round  her  bow  under  deck.^' 

In  his  next  report  (Barbadoes,  June  17,  1759),  the  cap- 
tain says : — 

"  These  are  to  acqt  you  of  my  arivel  heare  ye  day  before 
yesterday  from  anamaboe.  I  met  on  my  passage  22  days 
of  very  squaly  winds  &  continued  Rains  so  that  it  beat  my 
sails  alto  piceses.  .  .  .  My  slaves  is  not  landed  as  yet: 
they  are  56  in  number  for  owners  all  in  helth  &  fatt.  .  .  . 
I've  got  40  ounces  gould  dust  &  eight  or  nine  hundred 
weight  maligabar  pepper  for  owners." 

As  we  see  it  the  trade  was  horrible,  but  consider  the 
courage  and  fortitude  of  the  captain  and  crew  who,  after 
seeing  "day  Lite  al  round  her  bow  under  deck,"  headed 
away  across  the  ocean  on  a  passage  lasting  ten  weeks,  dur- 
ing which,  for  twenty-two  days,  they  faced  storms  which 
beat  the  sails  to  pieces  and  poured  floods  of  water  through 
the  open  seams. 

A  report  of  the  consignee  shows  that  forty-seven  of  the 
slaves  sold  for  £14^2  12s.  6d.  The  usual  price  of  a  slave  on 
the  African  coast  was  no  gallons  of  rum.  After  deduct- 
ing expenses,  the  consignees  credited  the  owners  of  the  ship 
with  ;;^i324.  After  adding  the  gold  dust,  the  pepper,  and 
the  small  sums  received  for  the  lumber  and  staves,  one 
sees  that  the  dividend  on  the  cost  of  the  Sanderson  0^450) 


BEFORE  THE  WAR  OF  THE  REVOLUTION   67 

was  large.  Of  the  price  received  for  the  remaining  negroes, 
and  the  profit  on  the  molasses  which  was  probably  carried 
home,  nothing  is  said  in  the  record.  (See  Am.  Hist. 
Record,  August  and  September,  1872). 

The  income  of  the  slaver  captain  was  large  for  that  day. 
In  addition  to  the  ordinary  monthly  wages,  he  received 
several  commissions.  "You  are  to  have  four  out  of  104 
for  your  coast  commission,"  wrote  the  owner  of  the 
schooner  Sierra  Leone,  in  which  Captain  Lindsay  made  a 
voyage  in  1754,  "  &  five  per  cent  for  the  sale  of  your  cargo 
in  the  West  Indies  &  five  per  cent  for  the  goods  you  pur- 
chase for  return  cargo.  You  are  to  have  five  slaves  Privi- 
lege, your  cheafe  mate  Two,  if  he  can  purchase  them,  & 
your  second  mate  two." 

The  "Privilege"  was  the  "private  venture"  of  the  trade. 
The  foremast  hands  had  no  "privilege."  Their  pay  was 
about  £t,  per  month. 

As  a  matter  of  record,  to  show  something  of  the  way 
business  was  done  by  the  ship-owners  of  the  day,  here  is 
a  copy  of  a  bill  of  lading,  followed  by  a  letter  of  instruc- 
tions to  a  captain  about  to  sail  in  the  slave  trade :  — 

"Shipped  by  the  Grace  of  God  in  good  order  and  well 
conditioned,  by  William  Johnson  &  Co.,  owners  of  the 
Sierra  Leone,  in  &  upon  the  said  Schooner  Sierra  Leone, 
where  of  is  master  under  God  for  this  present  voyage 
David  Lindsay,  &  now  riding  at  Anchor  in  Harbour  of 
Newport,  and  by  God's  Grace  bound  for  the  Coast  of 
Africa:    To  say.  Thirty-four  hogsheads,  Tenn  Tierces, 


68       THE   STORY   OF   THE   MERCHANT   MARINE 

Eight  barrels  &  six  half  barrels  Rum,  one  barrel  Sugar, 
sixty  Musketts,  six  half  barrels  Powder,  one  box  beads, 
Three  boxes  Snuff,  Two  barrels  Tallow,  Twenty-one 
barrels  Beef,  Pork  and  Mutton,  i4cwt.  i  qr.  22  lbs.  bread, 
one  barrel  mackerel,  six  shirts,  five  Jacketts,  one  piece 
blue  Calico,  one  piece  Chex,  one  mill,  shackles,  handcuffs 
&c. 

"Being  marked  and  numbered  as  in  the  Margent;  & 
are  to  be  delivered  in  like  good  Order  &  well  conditioned, 
at  the  aforesaid  port  of  the  coast  of  Affrica  (the  Dangers 
of  the  Seas  only  excepted)  unto  the  said  David  Lindsay 
or  to  his  assigns,  he  or  they  paying  Freight  for  the  said 
Goods,  nothing,  with  Primage  and  Average  accustomed. 
In  Witness  whereof,  the  master  or  purser  of  the  said 
Schooner  hath  affirmed  unto  three  Bills  of  Lading:  all 
of  this  Tenor  and  date :  one  of  which  Three  Bills  of  Lading 
being  accomplished  the  other  two  stand  void.  And  so 
God  send  the  good  Schooner  to  her  desired  Port  in  Safety : 
Amen." 

The  enormous  profits  of  the  slave  trade  were  made  in 
spite  of  active  competition.  In  1750  there  were  loi 
Liverpool  merchants  in  it,  while  London  had  135,  and 
Bristol  157.  The  English  slavers  were  much  larger  than 
the  American,  on  the  average,  being  able  to  carry  300. 
Nevertheless,  New  Rhode  Island  held  her  own  well.  In 
1740  she  had,  according  to  The  American  Slave  Trade, 
120  vessels  in  the  trade,  and  in  1770  the  number  was  150. 

An  interesting  view  of  the  seafaring  people  of  New 


BEFORE  THE  WAR  OF  THE  REVOLUTION   69 

England  in  the  seventeenth  century  is  found  in  the  auto- 
biograpliy  of  the  Rev.  John  Barnard,  who  served  Marble- 
head  well,  beginning  in  17 14.  He  says  that  upon  his 
arrival  in  the  place  "there  was  not  so  much  as  one  proper 
carpenter  nor  mason  nor  tailor  nor  butcher  in  the  town. 
The  people  contented  themselves  to  be  the  slaves  that 
digged  in  the  mines  [figuratively  speaking]  and  left  the 
merchants  of  Boston,  Salem  and  Europe  to  carry  away 
the  gains;  by  which  means  the  town  was  always  in  dis- 
mally poor  circumstances,  involved  in  debt  to  the  merchants 
more  than  they  were  worth ;  .  .  .  and  they  were  generally 
as  rude,  swearing,  drunken  and  fighting  a  crew  as  they 
were  poor. 

"  I  soon  saw  that  the  town  had  a  price  in  its  hands,  and 
it  was  a  pity  they  had  not  a  heart  to  improve  it.  I  there- 
fore laid  myself  out  to  get  acquainted  with  the  English 
masters  of  vessels  that  I  might  by  them  be  let  into  the 
mystery  of  the  fish  trade;  and  in  a  little  time  I  gained  a 
pretty  thorough  understanding  of  it.  When  I  saw  the 
advantages  of  it  I  thought  it  my  duty  to  stir  up  my  people 
.  .  ,  that  they  might  reap  the  benefit  of  it.  .  .  .  But 
alas !  I  could  inspire  no  man  with  courage  and  resolution 
enough  to  engage  in  it,  till  I  met  with  Mr.  Joseph  Swet, 
a  young  man  of  strick  justice,  great  industry,  enterprising 
genius,  quick  apprehension  and  firm  resolution,  but  of 
small  fortune.  To  him  I  opened  myself  fully,  laid  the 
scheme  clearly  before  him,  and  he  hearkened  unto  me. 
...     He  first  sent  a  small  cargo  to  Barbadocs. 


70      THE   STORY  OF   THE   MERCHANT  MARINE 

"He  soon  found  he  increased  his  stock,  built  vessels 
and  sent  the  fish  to  Europe,  and  prospered  in  the  trade. 
.  .  .  The  more  promising  young  men  of  the  town  soon 
followed  his  example,"  and  "now,  [1766]  we  have  between 
thirty  and  forty  ships,  brigs,  snows  and  topsail  schooners 
engaged  in  foreign  trade." 

Moreover  (and  it  is  an  important  matter  in  that  it 
shows  one  influence  of  shipping  in  that  day),  foreign  trade 
had  improved  the  manners  of  the  people.  "We  have 
many  gentlemanlike  and  polite  families." 

One  finds  in  the  documents  many  glimpses  and  not  a 
few  detailed  stories  of  life  in  what  may  be  called 
the  ordinary  trades  of  the  American  merchant  marine 
during  the  eighteenth  century.  Here,  for  example, 
are  some  extracts  from  a  diary  kept  by  a  Salem 
youth,  who  had  recently  graduated  from  Harvard  and 
was  making  a  voyage  to  Gibraltar  with  Captain  Richard 
Derby,  in  1759.  The  diary  is  to  be  found  in  the  posses- 
sion of  the  East  India  Marine  Society  of  Salem :  — 

"Nov.  12. —  Saw  a  sail  standing  to  the  S.  W.  I  am 
stationed  at  the  aftermost  gun  and  its  opposite  with 
Captain  Clifford.  We  fired  a  shot  at  her  and  she  hoisted 
Dutch  colors. 

"15.  —  Between  2  and  3  this  morning  we  saw  two  sail 
which  chased  us,  the  ship  fired  three  shots  at  us  which  we 
returned.  They  came  up  with  us  by  reason  of  a  breeze 
which  she  took  before  we  did.  She  proved  to  be  the 
ship  Cornwall  from  Bristol. 


'^ 


rX 


BEFORE  THE  WAR  OF  THE  REVOLUTION   71 

"  23.  —  We  now  begin  to  approach  to  land.  At  eight 
o'clock  two  Teriffa  (Barbary)  boats  came  out  after  us, 
they  fired  at  us  which  we  returned  as  merrily.  They 
were  glad  to  get  away  as  well  as  they  could.  We  stood 
after  one,  but  it  is  almost  impossible  to  come  up  with  the 
piratical  dogs. 

"  Dec.  —  10.  .  .  .  In  the  morning  we  heard  a  firing  and 
looked  out  in  the  Gut  and  there  was  a  snow  attacked  by  3  of 
the  piratical  Teriffa  boats.  Two  cutters  in  the  Government 
service  soon  got  under  sail,  3  men-of-war  that  lay  in  the 
road  manned  their  barges  and  sent  them  out,  as  did  a 
privateer.  We  could  now  perceive  her  (the  snow)  to  have 
struck,  but  they  soon  retook  her.  She  had  only  four 
swivels  and  six  or  eight  men.  .  .  .  They  got  some 
prisoners  (of  the  pirates)  but  how  many  I  cannot  learn, 
which  it  is  to  be  hoped  will  meet  with  their  just  reward 
which  I  think  would  be  nothing  short  of  hanging." 

Tales  of  the  resourcefulness  of  the  foremast  hands  on 
the  colonial  vessels  are  of  special  interest  here.  As  an 
example,  consider  that  of  the  brig  Sally,  which  turned 
bottom  up  while  on  her  way  from  Philadelphia  to  Santo 
Domingo,  on  August  8,  1765.  Six  of  the  crew  who  were 
on  deck  saved  themselves  at  first  by  clinging  to  such 
wreckage  as  floated  beside  the  hull,  and  then,  when  the 
squall  was  over,  climbed  to  the  upturned  keel.  Then,  to 
procure  food  and  drink,  they  cut  the  wreath  (a  flat  bar  of 
iron  encircling  the  mainmast  head)  from  its  place,  using 
their  jackknives,  it  may  be  supposed,  and  with  that  as 


72       THE   STORY   OF   THE   MERCHANT   MARINE 

a  tool  made  a  hole  through  the  bottom  of  the  hulk.  It 
took  six  days  of  continuous  labor,  watch  and  watch,  of 
course,  but  they  succeeded,  and  got  out  a  barrel  of 
bottled  beer  and  another  of  salt  pork.  During  the  six 
days  of  work  they  subsisted  without  water,  and  with  no 
other  food  than  the  barnacles  on  the  planking.  Moreover, 
they  built  a  platform  of  staves  and  shingles  upon  the 
sloping  bottom  of  the  hull,  upon  which  they  could  sleep 
without  danger  of  rolling  into  the  sea.  In  this  fashion 
they  lived  until  September  i,  twenty-three  days,  when  they 
were  rescued. 

Of  the  lost  rudders  that  were  replaced  with  pieces  of 
spare  spars  bound  together  with  rope,  and  the  small  boats 
made  by  castaways  who  had  nothing  but  barrel  hoops  and 
staves  with  canvas  for  planking,  no  more  than  mention 
need  be  made. 

In  the  log  of  the  sloop  Adventure,  Captain  Francis 
Boardman,  during  a  West  India  voyage,  in  1774,  are 
found  the  following  entries :  — 

"  This  Morning  I  Drempt  that  2  of  my  upper  teeth  and 
one  Lower  Dropt  out  and  another  Next  the  Lower  one  wore 
away  as  thin  as  a  wafer  and  Sundry  other  fritful  Dreams. 
What  will  be  the  Event  of  it  I  can't  tell." 

"this  Blot  I  found  the  17th.  I  can't  tell,  but  Some- 
thing Very  bad  is  going  to  hapen  me  this  Voyage.  I 
am  afeard  but  God  onley  Noes  What  may  hapen  on  board 
the  Sloop  Adventure  —  the  first  Voyage  of  being  Master." 

There  were  terrors  of  the  sea  of  which  the  masters  were 


BEFORE  THE  WAR  OF  THE  REVOLUTION   73 

more  " af eard "  than  they  were  of  the  "Teriffa"  pirates,  but, 
in  spite  of  all,  they  held  fast  tack  and  sheet,  continued 
on  the  course,  and  finally  told  in  the  log-book  —  at  least 
Captain  Boardman  did  —  just  what  came  after  the  dire 
portents.     On  arriving  off  Boston,  Boardman  wrote:  — 

"The  End  of  this  Voyage  for  wich  I  am  very  thankful 
on  Acct.  of  a  Grate  Deal  of  Trouble  by  a  bad  mate.  His 
name  is  William  Robson  of  Salem.  He  was  drunk  most 
part  of  the  voyage." 

The  Captain  Richard  Derby  mentioned  above  was  one 
of  several  generations  of  Salem  Derbys  that  followed  the 
sea  with  success.  A  letter  written  by  him  while  at 
Gibraltar,  in  1758,  gives  a  good  idea  of  the  state  of  trade 
at  that  time :  — 

"I  wrote  you  the  ist  instant  by  way  of  Cadiz  and 
Lisbon;  since  which  I  have  landed  my  white  sugar  and 
sold  it  for  $17^  per  cwt.,  and  my  tar  I  have  sold  at  $8^ 
per  bbl.  I  have  not  as  yet  sold  any  of  my  fish,  nor  at 
present  does  there  appear  to  be  any  buyer  for  it;  but 
as  it  is  in  very  good  order,  and  no  fear  of  its  spoiling,  I 
intend  to  keep  it  a  little  longer.  I  am  in  hopes  that  this 
Levanter  will  bring  down  a  buyer  for  it.  I  hope  to  get 
$12  for  my  brown  sugar.  We  have  this  day  had  the 
Sallie  delivered  up  to  us,  and  intend  to  sell  her  for  the 
most  she  will  fetch ;  as  to  sending  her  to  the  West  Indies, 
I  am  sure  if  she  was  loaded  for  St.  Eustia,  she  would 
be  seized  by  the  privateers  before  she  got  out  of  the  road, 
and  having  no  papers  but  a  pass,  would  be  sufficient  to 


74      THE   STORY  OF  THE  MERCHANT  MARINE 

condemn  her  in  the  West  Indies,  if  she  should  be  taken 
by  an  English  cruiser.  I  have  bought  140  casks  of  claret, 
at  $10  per  cask,  which  I  intend  to  bring  home  with  me. 
I  have  written  Alicant  for  500  dozen  handkerchiefs,  if  they 
can  be  delivered  for  $4  current  per  dozen.  My  cargo 
home  I  intend  shall  be  140  casks  of  claret,  20  butts  of 
Mercil  wine,  500  casks  of  raisins,  some  soap,  and  all  the 
small  handkerchiefs  I  can  get." 

By  way  of  illustrating  the  dangers  of  losses  from  assaults 
by  armed  vessels  under  the  English  flag,  it  should  be  told 
that  in  1759  a  Salem  schooner  named  the  Three  Brothers 
was  overhauled  by  an  English  privateer  that  took  away 
such  specie  from  her  as  was  found  on  board,  and  then 
sent  her  to  one  of  the  West  India  Islands  "to  be  robbed 
again  by  a  court  of  admiralty,"  as  the  senior  Derby,  her 
owner,  wrote.  In  1672  another  Derby  vessel  was  captured 
by  a  Frenchman  who  took  a  bond  of,  and  released,  her. 
The  old  captain  sent  a  cartel  in  due  course  to  redeem  the 
bond,  but  a  British  warship  seized  her  on  the  charge  that 
she  was  bound  to  a  port  of  the  enemy.  The  court  in 
England  acquitted  the  cartel,  but  in  the  meantime  the 
owner  of  the  vessel  had  been  put  to  a  great  expense 
unnecessarily,  and  he  had  no  redress. 

Richard  Derby  mentioned  above  bought  a  French 
prize  of  300  tons  at  Gibraltar,  loaded  her  with  wine,  and 
sent  her  under  Captain  George  Crowninshield  to  the  West 
Indies,  where  her  cargo  was  sold  to  good  advantage,  and 
sugar  purchased.    With  this  she  headed  away  for  Leghorn, 


BEFORE  THE  WAR  OF  THE  REVOLUTION   75 

but  was  taken  by  an  English  privateer  on  the  plea  that 
she  had  no  register.  As  a  matter  of  fact  the  voyage  was 
entirely  lawful ;  she  had  no  register,  but  being  a  purchased 
prize,  she  did  not  need  one  until  she  should  be  able  to  go 
to  an  English  port.  Nevertheless,  when  the  vessel  was 
taken  before  the  court  in  the  Bahamas,  she  was  at  once 
condemned.  It  was  sheer  robbery.  The  records  of  that 
court  showed  that,  of  200  ships  that  had  been  brought 
in,  the  only  ones  escaping  condemnation  were  a  few  be- 
longing to  owners  who  had  been  willing  to  pay  the  judge 
a  higher  price  than  the  privateers  were.  The  governor 
of  the  colony  as  well  as  this  judge  had  gone  to  their  posts 
poor,  but  in  a  few  years  they  retired  worth  fortunes  of 
;^30,ooo  each. 

The  Derby  vessels  were  seized  in  each  case  on  the  charge 
that  they  had  violated  one  or  another  section  of  the  navi- 
gation laws.  The  navigation  laws  had  at  last  begun  to 
injure  the  shipping  of  the  colonial  owners.  A  remarkable 
change  had  taken  place  in  the  condition  of  affairs.  What 
had  happened,  and  through  what  agencies  had  the  change 
come? 

A  small  space  only  is  needed  for  a  statement  of  the  im- 
portant facts,  but  the  reader  is  reminded  that  here,  as  in 
the  case  of  slavery,  it  is  difficult  to  get  the  right  point  of 
view.  The  eighteenth-century  state  of  morality,  not  that 
of  the  twentieth,  prevailed. 

From  the  beginning  of  the  eighteenth  century  until 
well  past  the  middle,  England  was  constantly  at  war  with 


76      THE   STORY  OF  THE   MERCHANT   MARINE 

France  and  Spain  in  spite  of  treaties  that  were  made  from 
time  to  time  to  provide  for  peace.  There  was  never  a 
day  from  1700  to  1763  when  the  ships  of  either  nation  were 
free  to  sail  the  seas  unmolested.  It  was  the  period  during 
which  Lord  Clive  fought  the  battles  of  his  country  in 
the  East  Indies,  and  when,  in  America,  the  frontiersman 
never  saw  the  sun  set  without  a  well-grounded  fear  that 
the  night  would  bring  bloodthirsty  and  fiendishly  cruel 
enemies  prowling  around  his  cabin.  According  to  the 
documents  that  remain,  these  long  wars  were  seemingly 
no  more  than  disputes  over  boundaries  (neighborhood 
quarrels  over  line  fences),  or  efforts  to  avenge  some  such 
personal  injury  as  that  when  Captain  Jenkins  had  his  ear 
cut  off  by  the  Spaniards  while  sailing  near  the  coast  of 
Cuba.  But  as  seen  now,  each  seemingly  petty  quarrel 
was  but  a  feature  of  a  prolonged  struggle  between  races 
for  the  commercial  control  of  the  New  World. 

"Shall  half  the  World  be  England's  for  industrial 
purposes,  ...  or  shall  it  be  Spain's  for  arrogant-torpid, 
sham-devotional  purposes  contrary  to  every  Law?"  is 
the  way  Carlyle  put  the  question  in  his  history  of  Frederick 
the  Great,  and  he  adds:  "The  incalculable  Yankee 
Nation  itself,  biggest  Phenomenon  (once  thought  beauti- 
fullest)  of  these  Ages,  —  this  too  .  .  .  lay  involved." 

In  the  middle  of  the  century,  while  the  prolonged  struggle 
was  culminating,  privateering  as  a  method  of  warfare 
reached  its  zenith.  The  Thurots  and  De  Cocks  of 
France  and  the  Wrights  of  England  swarmed  over  the 


BEFORE  THE  WAR  OF  THE  REVOLUTION   77 

seas,  gathering  fortune  and  a  sort  of  fame  not  soon  to  be 
forgotten.  They  captured  thousands  of  ships  —  literally, 
and  if  the  truth  be  told,  the  French  got  more  ships  than 
the  Wrights  did.  But  during  the  period  preceding  the 
declaration  of  open  war  in  1756  the  English  privateers 
were  alone  especially  active  and  successful.  They  brought 
in  300  ships  manned  by  10,000  men,  and  the  ships  were 
confiscated  and  the  men  imprisoned. 

Still  more  important  to  this  story,  however,  is  the  fact 
that  many  Dutch  as  well  as  French  ships  were  looted  by 
the  English.  While  the  assaults  upon  the  French  were 
justified  because  they  avenged  similar  assaults  made  by 
French  privateers,  and  because  enough  French  sailors  to 
man  a  fleet  of  battleships  were  thereby  sequestered,  there 
was  no  such  excuse  for  looting  the  Dutch.  Nevertheless, 
by  the  real  standards  of  international  law  of  that  century 
(not  the  avowed  standards),  these  captures  were  justified 
on  the  ground  of  necessity  in  connection  with  the  end  for 
which  the  war  was  waged  with  such  "fierce,  deep-breathed 
doggedness  "  —  commercial  supremacy.  For  when  war 
was  raging,  the  ships  of  neutral  nations  were  permitted 
by  ordinary  international  usage  to  carry  on  their  commer- 
cial operations  unmolested.  The  Dutch,  being  neutrals, 
gained  rapidly  in  the  carrying  trade  of  the  world.  They 
even  had  hope  that  they  might  attain  the  proud  position 
they  had  occupied  in  the  early  part  of  the  seventeenth 
century.  The  situation  looked  ominous  to  the  English. 
If  they  were  to  retain  the  supremacy  which  good  fighting 


78       THE    STORY   OF  THE   MERCHANT  MARINE 

in  Cromwell's  time  had  given  them,  it  was  absolutely  neces- 
sary to  destroy,  or  at  least  check,  in  some  way,  the  growing 
prosperity  of  the  Dutch,  It  was  to  this  end  that  English 
privateers  (even  fishermen  in  open  boats,  armed  with 
clubs)  were  encouraged  in  looting  Dutch  merchantmen. 
To  give  color  of  law  to  this  form  of  piracy,  the  "Rule  of 
1756"  was  provided.  Under  this  rule,  which  was  merely 
a  dictum  of  the  English  crown,  neutral  ships  were  for- 
bidden to  enter  any  trade  in  time  of  war  from  which  they 
were  commonly  excluded  in  time  of  peace.  For  example, 
the  Dutch  were  excluded  from  the  trade  between  France 
and  the  French  colonies  in  time  of  peace ;  when  war  was 
declared,  the  French  were  glad  to  have  Dutch  ships  in 
the  trade,  but  England  declared  she  would  confiscate  every 
Dutch  ship  found  in  it. 

With  these  facts  in  mind,  —  remembering  especially 
that  in  the  state  of  civilization  then  prevailing,  some 
forms  of  piracy  were  justified  by  expediency,  —  recall 
the  feeling  with  which  an  influential  part  of  the  people 
of  England  were  coming  to  regard  the  colonies. 

"How  much  I  despise  them !"  wTote  Lord  Bellomont, 
in  1700,  when  some  New  England  merchants  objected 
to  his  seizure,  confessedly  contrary  to  law,  of  a  cargo  of 
timber.  In  1724  the  master  ship-builders  of  the  Thames 
united  in  a  formal  complaint  to  the  king,  in  which  they 
said,  truthfully,  that  their  trade  was  depressed  and  their 
workmen  were  emigrating  because  of  the  competition  of 
the  New  England  yards.     Nor  were  the  ship-builders  the 


BEFORE  THE  WAR  OF  THE  REVOLUTION   79 

only  ones  in  England  who  were  depressed  by  American 
competition.  The  books  of  Sir  Josiah  Child  were,  perhaps, 
no  longer  read,  but  his  warnings  were  coming  to  be  heeded 
more  and  more,  and  the  contempt  which  Lord  Bellomont 
had  expressed  was  well-nigh  universal  among  the  nobility. 

As  the  reader  remembers,  the  petition  of  the  Thames 
ship-builders  was  not  granted.  As  late  as  1739  Walpole 
said :  — 

"It  has  been  a  maxim  with  me  to  encourage  the  trade 
of  the  American  colonies  in  the  utmost  latitude.  Nay, 
it  has  been  necessary  to  pass  over  some  irregularities." 

That  was  a  most  important  statement.  In  1739  Wal- 
pole encouraged  the  trade  of  the  Americans  in  the  utmost 
latitude.  With  inconsiderable  exceptions  as  to  time  and 
conditions,  the  Americans  had  been,  in  fact,  encouraged  in 
the  utmost  latitude  during  nearly  100  years.  Even  a  tax 
laid  on  foreign  molasses,  at  the  request  of  the  English 
West  Indies,  in  1733,  had  been  as  dead  as  the  navigation 
laws  of  Charles  II, 

But  when  the  privateers  of  England  were  loosed  to  prey 
upon  neutral  ships  as  well  as  on  those  of  the  enemy,  the 
navigation  laws  were  suddenly  revived.  The  privateers 
found,  in  the  colonial  evasions  of  these  laws,  golden  op- 
portunities to  secure  plunder,  for  colonial  ships  were  con- 
stantly evading  the  laws,  and  the  penalty  for  doing  so 
was  confiscation  in  favor  of  the  informer.  Naturally  the 
English  privateers  seized  the  colony  ships  all  the  more 
eagerly  because  of  England's  growing  jealousy  of  American 


8o      THE   STORY   OF   THE   MERCHANT   MARINE 

shipping.  The  role  of  these  piratical  privateers  as  guar- 
dians of  the  law  was  supported  by  courts  of  admiralty 
which  were  composed  of  judges  who  received  fees  that 
were   increased  by  every  condemnation. 

For  the  sake  of  emphasis  let  the  facts  be  repeated. 
After  a  period  of  nearly  loo  years,  during  which  such 
leaders  as  Walpole  had  "encouraged"  American  ship- 
owners "in  the  utmost  latitude,"  a  horde  of  pirates  and 
corrupt  judges  resurrected  the  law;  and  when  a  valuable 
prize  was  in  question,  they  even  disregarded  the  law  they 
pleaded,  as  well  as  justice,  to  condemn  her.  And  there 
was  no  redress. 

Of  the  acts  of  the  British  government  in  connection  with 
the  Stamp  Act,  the  duty  on  tea,  and  the  other  efforts  to 
tax  the  American  colonists  contrary  to  their  constitutional 
rights  as  British  citizens,  nothing  need  be  said  here  except 
to  remind  the  reader  that  ships  of  the  royal  navy  were 
commissioned  as  revenue  cutters  and  stationed  on  the 
American  coast  (1764),  from  Casco  Bay  to  Cape  Henlopen. 

To  illustrate  the  conditions  that  prevailed  thereafter 
until  the  War  of  the  Revolution,  here  is  a  brief  account 
of  the  events  in  Rhode  Island  waters  that  led  to  the  de- 
struction of  the  British  naval  revenue  cutter  Gaspe. 

The  schooner  St.  John,  Lieutenant  Hill  commanding, 
was  the  first  of  the  naval  fleet  stationed  in  Rhode  Island 
waters.  It  was  the  duty  of  Lieutenant  Hill  to  examine 
every  vessel  trading  in  those  waters  to  Icam  whether  she 
were  violating  the  laws.      A  brig  that  had  discharged  cargo 


BEFORE  THE  WAR  OF  THE  REVOLUTION   8i 

at  Rowland's  Ferry  was  suspected  of  being  a  smuggler,  but 
she  was  not  molested  until  she  had  gone  to  sea.  Then 
she  was  followed,  brought  back,  and  found  to  be  entirely 
innocent.  If  examined  before  sailing,  no  injury  to 
her  owners  would  have  resulted,  but  to  bring  her  back 
when  well  under  way,  and  that,  too,  at  the  whim  of  a 
supercilious  naval  officer,  not  only  caused  loss  but  roused 
indignation.  A  mob  of  Newport  people  gathered  to  attack 
the  schooner,  but  they  were  prevented  doing  so  by  the 
arrival  of  another  man-o'-war  in  the  harbor. 

While  the  people  were  yet  fretted  by  the  needless  inter- 
ference with  the  brig,  the  man-o'-war  Maidstone  came  to 
port,  and  began  impressing  seamen  from  the  merchant 
ships  in  the  bay,  and  finally  took  the  entire  crew  from  a 
ship  just  home  from  the  year-long  voyage  to  the  coast  of 
Africa.  It  seems  impossible,  now,  that  a  naval  officer 
should  be  guilty  of  such  needless  cruelty  as  taking  men 
under  such  circumstances,  but  the  truth  is  that  the  naval 
officers  of  that  period  found  pleasure  in  cruelty.  It 
was  because  of  inhumanity  —  the  harshness  with  which 
men  were  treated  in  the  navy  —  that  impressment  was 
necessary.  The  friends  and  relatives  of  the  impressed 
seamen  were  unable  to  obtain  redress,  but  they  expressed 
their  feelings  by  burning  one  of  the  Maidstone^s  small 
boats. 

In  1769  Captain  William  Reid,  commanding  the 
war-sloop  Liberty,  seized  a  merchant  brig  on  Long  Island 
Sound  and  brought  her  to  Newport,  where,  although   it 


82      THE   STORY   OF   THE   MERCHANT   MARINE 

was  found  that  she  was  not,  and  had  not  been,  violating 
the  law  in  any  way,  she  was  held  for  several  days.  And 
when  the  captain  of  the  brig  went  to  the  Liberty  in  an  effort 
to  secure  release,  and,  on  failing,  expressed  his  indigna- 
tion in  sailor  language,  a  number  of  muskets  were  fired 
at  him.  To  avenge  this  indignity,  a  mob  boarded  the 
Liberty  that  night,  cut  away  her  mast,  threw  her  guns 
overboard,  and  when  she  drifted  ashore  on  Goat  Island, 
burned  her. 

Finally  the  Gaspe,  commanded  by  Lieutenant  William 
Dudingston,  came  to  the  bay.  Dudingston  thought  that 
every  innocent  colonial  vessel  in  those  waters  ought  to 
be  subjected  to  every  inconvenience  rather  than  let  one 
smuggler  escape.  In  fact,  the  naval  officers  on  the  coast 
had  all  come  to  the  opinion  that  all  colonists  were  criminals, 
as  well  as  of  the  lowest  class  of  people  in  the  social  scale, 
and  that  it  was  a  duty  to  inflict  punishment  upon  them 
whenever  possible. 

In  this  frame  of  mind  Dudingston  stopped  everything 
afloat,  including  the  open  boats  carrying  farm  produce 
across  the  bay ;  threw  here  and  there  the  cargoes,  regardless 
of  the  losses  thus  created ;  looted  some  of  the  produce,  and 
finally  seized  a  sloop  (Fortune),  carrying  twelve  hogs- 
heads of  rum,  and  sent  her  to  the  Court  of  Admiralty  at 
Boston,  although  the  law  expressly  provided  that  vessels 
seized  in  Rhode  Island  waters  should  be  tried  by  the  Rhode 
Island  court. 

"I  was  not  ignorant  of  the  statute  to  the  contrary," 


BEFORE  THE  WAR  OF  THE  REVOLUTION  S^ 

wrote  Dudingston  to  Admiral  Montegue.  He  violated 
the  law  because  he  supposed  the  Massachusetts  court 
would  be  more  likely  to  condemn  the  sloop.  The  zeal 
of  the  lieutenant  was  highly  commended  by  the  admiral. 

Having  thus  roused  the  indignation  of  every  American 
living  in  the  region,  Dudingston  went  in  chase  of  the  packet 
sloop  Hannah,  in  her  passage  from  Newport  to  Providence, 
on  the  memorable  8th  of  June,  1772.  The  Hannah  was 
called  a  packet  because  she  plied  regularly  on  one  route. 
She  had  fully  complied  with  the  laws  before  leaving  New- 
port, but  Dudingston  stopped  everything,  as  said,  and  he 
now  tried  to  bring-to  the  Hannah,  but  Captain  Lindscy, 
commanding  her,  held  his  course.  She  had  sailed  at 
noon  with  a  fair  tide,  but  Lindsey  knew  that  she  would 
have  the  tide  against  her  for  two  hours,  at  best,  and  he 
was  not  going  to  spoil  the  passage  by  stopping,  and  thus 
losing  what  tide  was  coming  his  way.  Indignant  at  this  lack 
of  respect  for  one  of  the  king's  naval  ofiicers,  Lieutenant 
Dudingston  made  all  sail  in  chase,  and  followed  the  Hannah 
until  she  tacked  across  what  was  called  Namquit  (now 
Gaspee)  point,  when,  in  trying  to  follow  her,  the  Gaspe 
grounded. 

When  Captain  Lindsey  told  his  story  in  Providence,  a 
drummer  paraded  the  streets,  gathering  recruits,  and 
enough  men  assembled  to  fill  eight  "long  boats,"  the 
largest  size  of  boat  carried  by  merchant  ships.  Though 
these  men  were  going  to  attack  a  naval  vessel  armed  with 
cannon,  they  were  armed  with  but  few  weapons  better 


84      THE   STORY   OF   THE   MERCHANT   MARINE 

than  clubs  and  paving-stones.  Having  disguised  them- 
selves in  the  garb  of  Indians,  they  rowed  with  muffled  oars 
to  the  stranded  schooner,  shot  down  the  lieutenant  with 
one  of  the  few  muskets  carried,  clubbed  the  rest  of  the 
crew  into  submission,  and  then  burned  the  schooner. 
The  owner  of  the  Hannah,  who  instigated  this  attack 
upon  the  king's  vessel,  was  Captain  John  Brown,  the 
wealthiest  merchant  in  Providence.  The  leader  of  the 
expedition  was  Captain  Abraham  Whipple,  who,  as  a 
privateer,  had  taken  a  million  dollars'  worth  of  prizes 
during  the  wars  with  France  and  Spain.  The  whole  mob, 
for  a  mob  it  was  in  the  eyes  of  the  law,  were  representative 
citizens  not  only  of  Rhode  Island  but  of  all  the  seafaring 
people  of  the  colonies.  The  time  had  come  when  Ameri- 
cans would,  in  defence  of  Justice,  do  more  than  evade  an 
unjust  law;  in  burning  the  Gaspe  they  were,  as  Lord 
Dartmouth  declared,  ^'levying  war  against  the  king." 


CHAPTER   V 

MERCHANTMEN   IN  BATTLE  ARRAY 

SOME  of  the  most  stirring  tales  in  the  history  of  the 
American  merchant  marine  are  those  of  the  battles 
of  men  who,  like  Captain  Jonathan  Haraden,  of 
Salem,  commanded  armed  merchantmen  during  the  War 
of  the  Revolution.  These  stories  are  of  special  interest 
here  because  they  portray  one  side  of  the  character  of  the 
American  sailors  as  developed  by  the  peculiar  conditions 
where  forest  life  and  sea  life  met  at  the  surf-line.  But 
before  giving  any  of  these  tales,  it  seems  necessary  to 
describe  briefly  the  peculiarities  of  the  ships  in  use  in  the 
colonies  during  the  eighteenth  century. 

While  the  dictionaries  define,  fairly  well,  all  sorts  of 
sea  terms,  it  seems  worth  noting  here  that  a  ship,  in  the 
earliest  days  of  the  colonies,  had  three  masts,  two  of  which 
were  fitted  with  yards  to  spread  four-sided  sails  across  the 
hull,  while  the  third  carried  a  long,  slender  yard  that  spread 
a  lateen  sail  fore  and  aft.  Moreover,  a  square  sail  was 
spread  by  a  yard  that  hung  beneath  the  end  of  the  bow- 
sprit. Because  the  lateen  sail  was  difficult  to  handle, 
and  the  one  on  the  spritsail-yard  dipped  into  the  water, 
both  were  soon  abolished  on  the  American  ships.     Ameri- 

85 


86      THE   STORY   OF   THE   MERCHANT   MARINE 

can  sailors  were  high-priced,  economy  was  necessary,  and 
rigs  that  reduced  the  number  of  men  needed  were  adopted 
perforce. 

The  ketch  was  another  rig  that  did  not  last  long.  A 
ketch  had  one  mast  amidships,  with  yards  crossed  upon  it, 
and  another  smaller  mast  well  aft,  upon  which  yards  were 
also  crossed,  though  sometimes  a  fore-and-aft  sail  was 
found  there.  It  was,  doubtless,  the  worst  rig  ever  seen  in 
American  waters. 

The  snow  was  a  modified  brig.  She  had  two  masts 
with  yards  crossed  as  in  a  ship,  and  in  addition  had  a 
slender  mast  close  abaft  the  main  —  a  sort  of  spencer- 
mast  upon  which  a  fore-and-aft  sail  was  set.  This  style 
of  rig  lasted  much  longer  than  its  name,  though  that 
persisted  until  the  nineteenth  century. 

The  most  popular  rig,  during  the  first  hundred  years 
of  the  colonies,  was  the  sloop,  and  it  can  still  be  seen  on 
oyster  boats,  brick  carriers,  and  yachts.  No  other  rig 
will  give  a  hull  as  great  speed,  in  proportion  to  the  canvas, 
as  this  one,  and  yet  the  rig  can  be  managed  by  few  men, 
provided  they  know  their  work,  and  are  vigilant.  Long 
coasting  voyages  were  made  with  sloops  carrying  forty 
tons  of  cargo,  and  no  more  than  four  men.  Voyages  to 
the  West  Indies  were  made  in  larger  sloops  with  six  men, 
while  oversea  voyages  were  accomplished  with  one  or  two 
more. 

In  1 7 13  a  contemplation  of  the  advantages  of  the 
sloop  rig  led  Captain  Andrew  Robinson,  of  Gloucester, 


MERCHANTMEN  IN  BATTLE  ARRAY      87 

Mass.,  to  build  a  hull,  somewhat  larger  than  the 
ordinary  sloop  of  the  day,  and  place  in  it  two  masts, 
each  of  which  carried  the  sloop  rig.  If  rigged  as  a  sloop, 
the  one  sail  would  need  to  be  so  large  that  it  would  be 
difBcult  to  handle.  By  dividing  the  canvas  between  two 
sails  of  the  same  form,  a  great  enough  spread  for  speed 
would  be  obtained,  and  yet  neither  sail  would  be  larger 
than  the  single  one  on  a  smaller  hull.  The  sails  were  prob- 
ably stretched  before  this  vessel  was  launched,  and  one 
may  believe  that  the  novelty  of  the  rig  drew  a  large  crowd 
to  the  launching.  Beyond  doubt,  too,  everybody  cheered 
as  the  hull  took  the  water,  and  one  enthusiast  shouted,  — 

"Oh,  how  she  scoons  !" 

"Scoon"  referred  to  the  light  and  swift  motion  of  the 
hull  as  it  seemed  to  glide  over,  rather  than  plough  through, 
the  water,  but  Captain  Robinson,  who  had  been  wondering 
what  he  would  name  the  curious  rig,  seized  upon  the  word 
"scoon"  and  said,  "A  scooner  let  her  be  !" 

Perhaps  the  most  important  event  in  the  shipyards  of 
America,  previous  to  the  launching  of  Fulton's  steamer, 
was  the  invention  of  the  schooner.  For  under  this  rig  a 
hull  of  twice  the  capacity  of  an  ordinary  sloop  could  be 
handled  with  no,  or  but  a  small,  increase  in  the  number  of 
men.  Moreover,  the  cost  of  the  rig  was  less  than  that  of 
any  other  for  a  hull  of  similar  size.  In  short,  a  schooner 
gave  her  owner  more  ton-miles  of  work  than  any  other 
kind  of  vessel  for  each  dollar  of  expense.  Schooners  were 
soon  used  almost  exclusively  in  the  cod-fishery  on  the  banks. 


88      THE   STORY   OF   THE   MERCHANT   MARINE 

They  rapidly  made  their  way  into  the  coasting  trade,  where 
they  gathered  cargoes  for  the  ships  used  in  the  export  trade, 
and  served  to  strengthen  the  slender  cords  binding  one  part 
of  the  country  to  the  other.  They  even  went  on  foreign 
voyages  with  great  success  —  as  they  might  do  now,  if  only 
American  owners  would  take  what  lies  before  them. 

With  the  growth  of  American  shipping  it  was  inevitable 
that  American  sailors  should  go  privateering.  The  love 
of  adventure  was  born  into  the  people  who  lived  where  salt 
spray  gave  a  tang  to  the  odors  of  a  pine  forest.  Armed 
ships  from  Boston  hunted  Dutch  merchantmen  as  long  as 
the  Hudson  region  was  called  New  Amsterdam.  Ameri- 
can sailors  ate  broiled  rawhide  with  Morgan  on  the  banks 
of  the  Chagres  River.  Kidd  came  from  London  to  New 
York  seeking  sailors  bom  in  the  Highlands  of  the  Hudson, 
because  they  were,  of  all  men  in  the  world,  best  fitted  by 
experience  and  natural  inclination  for  the  work  he  had  in 
hand.  Franklin  at  one  time  expressed  the  hope  that  the 
American  coast  would  never  shelter  such  hosts  as  were 
found  in  Algiers  and  Tripoli,  and  the  thought  was  founded 
on  his  knowledge  of  the  eager  determination  to  get  on  in 
life,  at  all  hazards,  which  the  conditions  of  life  in  America 
had  generated. 

The  most  important  era  in  the  apprenticeship  of  the  co- 
lonial merchantmen  was  that  passed  in  fighting  the  French 
and  Spanish  during  England's  long  struggle  for  commer- 
cial supremacy  in  the  eighteenth  century,  a  period  during 
which  New  York  alone  commissioned  48  vessels,  carrying 


MERCHANTMEN  IN  BATTLE  ARRAY      89 

675  guns  and  5530  men.  As  affording  interesting  views  of 
the  work  done  by  the  American  seamen  at  that  time,  con- 
sider some  of  the  incidents  of  the  siege  of  Louisburg,  for 
while  the  siege  was  a  land  contest,  it  was  carried  on  by  men 
the  majority  of  whom,  perhaps,  were  sailors,  and  the  in- 
cidents to  be  recalled  were,  at  any  rate,  peculiarly  charac- 
teristic of  the  New  England  foremast  hand. 

The  armed  ships  numbered  thirteen,  and  ninety  mer- 
chantmen were  chartered  to  carry  the  men.  The  number 
of  ships  then  owned  in  the  colonies  at  that  time  is  nowhere 
stated,  but  it  was  not  difficult  to  gather  this  fleet  in  New 
England. 

Although  the  heavy  masonry  forts  at  Louisburg  mounted 
42-pounders,  the  heaviest  guns  the  fleet  carried  were  22- 
pounders ;  but  42-pounder  shot  were  cast  for  the  expedi- 
tion, and  taken  along,  because  every  man  in  the  fleet  was 
entirely  confident  that  42-pounders  would  soon  be  cap- 
tured from  the  enemy. 

Having  landed  about  two  miles  from  the  main  fortifica- 
tion (April  30,  1745),  one  William  Vaughan,  "a  youth  of 
restless  and  impetuous  activity,"  led  400  men  "to  the  hills 
near  the  town  and  saluted  it  with  three  cheers."  On 
May  2  this  same  impetuous  youth,  while  wandering  around 
with  a  squad  of  twelve  men  and  boys,  reached  a  number 
of  unguarded  storehouses  belonging  to  the  enemy.  They 
were  so  far  from  the  main  scene  of  activity  of  the  colonists 
that  the  French,  apparently,  had  not  thought  it  worth  while 
to  guard  them.    Vaughan  set  them  on  fire,  and  the  conflagra- 


90       THE    STORY   OF   THE   MERCHANT   MARINE 

tion  frightened  the  soldiers  in  a  large  detached  fort  so  much 
that  they  fled.  A  little  later  Vaughan  and  his  gang  took 
possession  of  the  abandoned  fort,  and  while  a  boy  of  eigh- 
teen years  climbed  the  flagstaff  and  spread  a  red  coat  to  the 
breeze  in  place  of  a  flag,  another  one  ran  to  the  colonial 
general  (Pepperrell)  with  this  message  from  Vaughan:  — 

"  May  it  please  your  Honour  to  be  informed  that  by  the 
grace  of  God  and  the  courage  of  thirteen  men,  I  entered 
the  Royal  Battery  about  9  o'clock,  and  am  waiting  for  a 
reinforcement  and  a  flag." 

The  4 2 -pounders  for  which  shot  had  been  cast  in 
Boston  were  secured  —  twenty-eight  of  them,  besides  two 
i8-pounders. 

When  the  siege  guns  were  landed  from  the  transports, 
and  an  effort  was  made  to  take  them  forward  across  a  wide 
swamp,  in  order  to  mount  them  where  they  would  reach 
the  town,  they  sank  out  of  sight  in  the  mud.  Thereupon 
the  men  made  a  broad-runner  sled  for  each  gun,  harnessed 
themselves  to  the  sleds,  and  waded  across  the  swamp,  drag- 
ging the  guns  after  them.  That  feat  has  excited  the  ad- 
miration of  all  historians  who  have  written  about  it.  But 
these  men  had  built  ships  a  mile  from  the  water  —  back  in 
the  woods  —  and,  when  each  was  ready  for  the  sea  had 
dragged  it  to  the  beach  with  many  yoke  of  oxen;  dragging 
cannon  across  the  swamp  was  a  small  matter  in  their 
estimation. 

A  trained  engineer  wanted  them  to  advance  upon  the  big 
fort  of  the  enemy  in  the  usual  scientific  manner  —  by  dig- 


MERCHANTMEN  IN  BATTLE  ARRAY     91 

ging  parallels,  one  after  another,  and  covering  every  step 
of  the  advance  with  earthworks.  The  proposal  made 
them  laugh.  Taking  advantage  of  a  foggy  night,  they  went 
forward,  rolling  sugar  hogsheads,  brought  for  the  purpose, 
before  them,  until  they  arrived  at  the  most  advanced  point 
desirable,  and  there  they  up-ended  the  hogsheads,  filled 
them  with  dirt,  mounted  their  siege  guns  (including  42- 
pounders  taken  from  the  royal  fort),  and  opened  fire. 

Meanwhile  they  were  without  tents;  their  clothing  and 
shoes  wore  out  under  the  excessive  abrading  of  their  work; 
they  were  soaked  by  cold  rains,  but  shelters  of  evergreen 
boughs  were  erected,  and  "while  the  cannon  bellowed  in 
front  .  .  .  the  men  raced,  wrestled,  pitched  quoits,  fired 
at  marks,"  and  "ran  after  the  French  cannon  balls  that 
sometimes  fell  in  the  camp"  where  "frolic  and  confusion 
reigned"  perpetually. 

The  capture  of  Louisburg  had  small  effect  upon  the 
country,  but  the  work  of  the  besiegers,  rightly  seen,  was  of 
the  most  important  ever  done  in  the  colonies.  Through- 
out the  siege  they  were  inspired  by  the  idea  that  "  the  All 
of  Things  is  an  infinite  conjugation  of  the  verb  To  Do^\- 
they  took  hold  of  each  task  with  hearty  good-will,  and  were 
irrepressible;  their  rude  disregard  for  convention  gave 
opportunity  to  their  resourcefulness,  and  contributed  to 
the  evolution  of  military  science.  And  lessons  learned  be- 
fore Louisburg  were  applied  at  Bunker  Hill,  and  elsewhere, 
during  the  Revolution. 

Among  the  heroes  of  the  privateer  ships  of  the  Revolu- 


92       THE   STORY    OF    THE    MERCHANT   MARINE 

tion  we  may  well  recall  Captain  Jonathan  Haraden,  as  a 
type.  In  1780  he  sailed  from  Salem  in  the  180-ton  ship 
Pickering,  armed  with  fourteen  6-pounders,  manned  by 
about  fifty  men,  all  told,  bound  to  Bilboa  with  a  cargo 
of  sugar.  At  this  period  of  the  war  the  British,  taught  by 
experience,  had  sent  out  fleets  of  frigates  and  sloops  of  war, 
besides  many  brigs,  cutters,  and  privateers  of  large  size  in 
order  to  suppress  the  armed  ships  of  the  "  rebels."  On  the 
way  across,  Haraden  met  a  heavy  cutter  and  beat  her  off. 
While  reaching  across  the  Bay  of  Biscay,  one  night,  he 
overhauled  a  ship  the  lookouts  of  which  appeared  to  be 
asleep ;  for  there  was  no  stir  upon  her  deck  until  Haraden 
hailed  and  ordered  her  to  surrender,  saying  that  his  ship 
was  an  American  frigate  and  he  intended  firing  a  broadside 
immediately.  The  sleepy  captain  obeyed  the  order.  It 
was  then  learned  that  she  was  a  privateer  much  superior 
to  the  Pickering  in  the  number  of  guns  and  of  men.  On 
arriving  off  Bilboa  a  big  armed  ship  was  seen  coming  out, 
and  the  captured  captain  told  Haraden  she  was  the  priva- 
teer Achilles,  mounting  forty-two  guns  and  manned  by  140 
men. 

"I  shan't  run  from  her,"  said  Haraden,  quietly. 

The  Achilles  took  possession  of  the  privateer  captured 
in  the  Bay  of  Biscay,  but  because  it  was  a  calm  night,  and 
the  Pickering  would  be  unable  to  escape,  the  captain  of 
the  Achilles  determined  to  wait  until  morning  before 
attacking.  On  seeing  this,  Haraden  arranged  a  proper 
lookout  and  then  went  to  sleep. 


MERCHANTMEN  IN  BATTLE  ARRAY      93 

At  dawn,  when  the  Achilles  came  down  ready  for  battle, 
the  Pickering  was  lying  so  far  inshore  that  a  throng  of 
people,  supposed  to  number  100,000,  gathered  on  the  hills 
to  watch  the  contest,  and  they  found  the  spectacle  worth 
the  trouble  taken.  Calling  his  men  to  the  mast,  Haraden 
assured  them  that  they  would  win  in  spite  of  the  greater 
force  of  the  enemy,  and  then  ordered  them  to  "Take  par- 
ticular aim  at  the  white  boot  top." 

Inspired  by  the  air  of  confidence  with  which  the  captain 
had  addressed  them,  the  men  returned  to  quarters.  Their 
ship  was  loaded  down  so  far  in  the  water  that  she  "ap- 
peared little  larger  than  a  long  boat"  when  the  Achilles 
ranged  alongside,  but,  as  Captain  Haraden  had  foreseen, 
the  difference  in  height  gave  him  a  decisive  advantage. 

The  Achilles,  with  her  great  battery  and  numerous  crew, 
opened  a  fire  that  seemed  overwhelming.  But  at  that 
time  (and  for  years  afterward)  English  sailors  relied  upon 
speed  of  fire  only  to  win  their  battles;  the  guns  of  the 
Achilles  were  discharged  without  aiming,  and  because  the 
gun  deck  was  far  above  the  water,  nearly  every  shot 
passed  over  the  Pickering.  But  the  American  gunners 
were  half  sailor,  half  backwoodsmen ;  they  took  particular 
aim  at  the  white  boot  top  of  the  Achilles,  and  drove  so 
many  shot  through  her  side  near  the  water-line  that,  after 
about  three  hours  of  fighting,  the  British  captain  found 
that  he  would  have  to  haul  off  or  sink.  He  decided  to 
fly.  Then,  on  seeing  the  British  sailors  running  to  the 
braces  to  swing  the  yards,  Haraden  ordered  his  gunners 


94      THE   STORY   OF   THE   MERCHANT   MARINE 

to  load  with  crowbars,  hoping  to  cut  the  rigging  of  the 
Achilles  with  these  curious  projectiles,  and  thus  keep  her 
from  running  away;  but  "she  had  a  mainsail  as  large  as 
a  ship  of  the  line,"  and  when  that  sail  began  to  draw  she 
escaped. 

As  the  Pickering  and  her  recaptured  prize  came  to  an- 
chor in  the  bay,  the  enthusiastic  spectators  of  the  battle 
flocked  off  in  such  numbers  that  at  one  time  it  would  have 
been  possible  to  build  with  the  boats  around  her  a  pon- 
toon bridge  reaching  from  ship  to  shore. 

When  Captain  William  Gray  was  a  lieutenant  on  the 
privateer  Jack,  she  was  attacked  by  one  of  the  enemy  of 
such  superior  force  that  she  was  soon  disabled.  There- 
upon the  enemy  came  alongside  and  tried  to  board.  In 
heading  his  men  in  repelling  the  attack,  Gray  was  struck 
by  a  bayoneted  musket  which  had  been  pitchpoled  at 
him.  The  bayonet  pinned  him  fast  to  a  gun  carriage  so 
that  he  was  unable  to  get  away,  but  after  one  of  his  men 
had  withdrawn  the  bayonet,  he  again  attacked  the  boarders 
and  they  were  repelled. 

When  Captain  John  Manly  commanded  the  privateer 
Jason,  of  Boston,  he  was  chased  by  a  British  frigate  into 
a  roadstead  near  the  Isle  of  Shoals.  He  would  have  been 
captured  there  but  for  a  friendly  squall  which,  while  it 
dismasted  him,  drove  away  the  frigate.  At  this,  how- 
ever, Manly's  troubles  began.  He  had  previously  lost  the 
privateer  Cumberland,  and  his  crew  decided  that  the  dis- 
masting was  clear  proof  that  he  was  unlucky.     A  mutiny 


MERCHANTMEN  IN  BATTLE  ARRAY      95 

followed,  but  Manly,  snatching  a  cutlass  from  one  of  the 
crew,  attacked  the  mutineers  single-handed,  and  after 
cutting  down  two  of  them,  set  the  remainder  at  work  re- 
rigging  the  ship;  and  he  kept  them  at  it  until  she  was 
ready  for  sea  thirty-six  hours  later.  Finally,  he  went  to 
Sandy  Hook  and  captured  two  big  privateers  fresh  from 
that  port  and  very  valuable. 

As  noted  in  the  Story  of  the  New  England  Whalers,  there 
is  abundant  reason  for  saying  that  "out  of  the  1700  men 
who  had  manned  Nantucket  whalers  before  the  war,  some 
hundreds  shipped  on  the  privateers.  They  took  kindly 
to  a  calling  in  which  there  was  such  a  strong  element  of 
chance.  The  hope  of  good  luck  was  strong  within  them." 
When  an  American  privateer  was  captured  by  the  enemy, 
they  separated  the  Nantucket  men  from  the  remainder  of 
the  crew,  and  then  by  bribery  on  the  one  hand,  and  star- 
vation and  other  kinds  of  ill  treatment,  on  the  other,  they 
forced  as  many  as  possible  into  the  English  whaleships. 

Many  more  tales  might  be  related,  but  the  facts  here 
given  show  well  enough  that  the  men  who  were  at  once 
woodsmen,  ship-builders,  fishermen,  and  sailors  could 
also  fight.  It  is  especially  notable  that  they  could  usually 
think  calmly  and  decide  swiftly,  as  Haraden  did.  The 
conditions  under  which  the  American  seamen  of  the 
period  had  been  reared  had  made  them,  as  so  frequently 
pointed  out  herein,  at  once  resourceful,  enterprising,  per- 
sistent, and  unafraid. 

The  records  of  the  privateers  are  so  few  in  number  that 


96      THE   STORY   OF   THE   MERCHANT  MARINE 

only  imperfect  estimates  can  be  made  of  the  number  and 
force  of  the  fleet.  The  Continental  Congress  bonded 
1699  privateers  during  the  war,  but  since  many  ships  were 
bonded  more  than  once,  some  under  different  names,  it  is 
not  possible  to  say  how  many  individual  ships  were  thus 
represented.  Further  than  that  the  colonies  commis- 
sioned many  vessels  that  had  no  commission  from  the 
Congress.  Hale,  in  Winsor's  History  of  America,  says 
that  Massachusetts  owned  600  privateers.  Salem  alone 
owned  158.  More  than  200  were  owned  in  Connecticut, 
Rhode  Island,  and  New  Hampshire.  The  fleets  of  the 
Delaware,  the  Chesapeake,  and  of  Charleston  were  con- 
siderable. Certainly  more  than  1000  armed  ships  were 
sent  to  sea  by  American  owners  to  seize  the  merchant- 
men of  the  enemy.  The  fishing  smack  Wasp,  carrying 
9  men  and  no  cannon,  was,  perhaps,  the  weakest;^  the 
Deane,  carrying  30  cannon  and  210  men,  was  the  most 
powerful.  There  were  40  American  privateers  of  the 
force  of  20  guns  and  100  men  or  larger. 

American  histories  have,  almost  without  exception, 
glorified  these  privateers.  They  note  that  Dodsley's 
Register  for  1778  recorded  the  capture  of  733  British  ships 
by  American  cruisers,  of  which  559  were  brought  into 
port.  What  these  prizes  sold  for  is  not  recorded,  but  it 
appears  that  the  British  loss  was  estimated  at  ;;^2, 600,000. 
Gomer  Williams,  in  his  history  of  the  Liverpool  priva- 

'  Many  vessels  went  out  without  cannon,  expecting  to  capture  guns 
from  the  enemy. 


MERCHANTMEN  IN  BATTLE  ARRAY      97 

teers,  says  that  the  War  of  the  Revolution  put  an  entire 
stop  to  the  commercial  progress  of  that  port.  It  was  the 
venturesome  American  privateer  who  haunted  the  Irish 
channel  until  the  Dublin  linen  fleet  sailed  under  convoy 
to  Chester,  that  thus  injured  Liverpool.  According  to 
Troughton,  another  Liverpool  historian,  "the  manners 
of  ♦the  common  people"  of  the  town  "made  a  retrogression 
towards  barbarism."  Mr.  Hale  estimates  that  3000  Brit- 
ish ships  were  captured,  and  that  the  losses  crippled  the 
commercial  prosperity  of  England  severely. 

On  the  other  hand,  however,  while  the  American  cruis- 
ers were  capturing  the  773  British  ships,  the  British  cruisers 
captured  and  sent  into  port  904  American  ships,  which 
brought  the  captors  ;^2ooo  each  on  the  average.  The 
losses  of  the  American  owners  were,  of  course,  much 
larger.  Worse  yet,  the  American  ships  were  all  eventu- 
ally driven  from  the  seas,  save  only  as  a  few  of  the  largest 
and  most  powerful  were  able  to  dodge  and  outsail  the 
frigates  and  sloops-of-war  which  the  British  sent  in  pur- 
suit of  them.  Haraden  himself,  though  he  captured  more 
than  a  thousand  guns  from  the  enemy,  was  at  last  caught 
at  St.  Eustatia  by  Admiral  Rodney's  fleet. 

If  the  accounts  of  gains  and  losses  could  be  posted  ledger 
fashion,  the  struck  balance  would  show  that  while  the  cap- 
tured goods  *  were  at  times  almost  the  only  resource  of  the 

^  The  following  is  the  inventory  of  the  cargo  of  the  sloop  Charm- 
ing Sally,  v>'hkh  "cleared  out  from  Dominica  to  Newfoundland,"  and 
was  eventually  considered  as  a  prize  by  the  Continental  Congress: 
"1300  bushels  of  salt;    14  hogsheads  of  molasses;    120  gallons  of  rum; 

H 


98      THE   STORY   OF   THE   MERCHANT   MARINE 

colonists  needing  goods  of  foreign  manufacture,  and  while, 
too,  a  few  individuals  were  enriched,  the  losses  of  the  ship 
merchants  as  a  class,  and  of  the  country,  far  outweighed 
the  gains.  American  independence  was  not  won,  as  so 
often  claimed,  by  the  privateers ;  it  was  not  even  forwarded. 

There  was  a  further  loss,  which,  though  it  cannot  be 
measured,  was  real.  There  is  abundant  evidence  to  show 
that  the  successes  of  the  few  made  gamblers,  and  even 
thieves,  of  many  merchants.  While  two  frigates  were  on 
the  stocks  in  Rhode  Island,  the  timber  belonging  to  the 
government  was  stolen  for  use  in  privateers.  Still  another 
evil  influence  is  found  in  the  fact  that  the  magnified  stories 
of  privateer  work  made  the  people  believe  that  the  greed 
of  the  merchants  would  serve  to  defend  the  new-bom 
nation  from  foreign  aggression  better  than  a  navy  could 
do  it.  And  not  until  after  the  War  of  181 2  was  brought 
upon  us  was  the  miserable  delusion  dispelled. 

In  two  respects  only  did  the  privateers  serve  the  Ameri- 

65  reams  of  writing  paper;  i  hogshead  and  27  demijohns  of  claret  wine; 
27  bottles  of  French  cordials;  5  cases  of  oil  of  olives  and  anchovies;  4 
ankers  of  brandy;  150,000  pins;  24  pairs  of  wool  cards;  10  pieces  of 
linen  and  checks;  500  pounds  of  shot;  i  cask  of  powder;  150  pounds  of 
coffee;  4  umbrellas;  100  yards  of  osnaburghs;  4  beaver  hats;  i  Negro 
man ;  i  suit  of  velvet ;  i  suit  of  black  cloth ;  i  suit  of  light-colored  cloth ; 
I  suit  of  purple  cloth;  2^  dozen  of  shirts;  2  dozen  of  neck  cloths;  3 
dozen  of  handkerchiefs;  4  dozen  of  silk  and  thread  stockings;  3  dozen  of 
linen  waistcoats  and  breeches;  2  chintz  nightgowns;  several  short  coats; 
great  coat  and  cloak;  J  piece  of  cambrick;  8  yards  of  crimson  silk;  i 
dozen  pair  of  French  laced  ruf33es;  bedding;  table  linen;  musket  sword; 
pistols;  2  blunderbusses;  quadrant,  and  other  instruments;  small  library 
of  books." 


MERCHANTMEN  IN  BATTLE  ARRAY     99 

can  merchant  marine  well :  they  gave  some  thousands  of 
individual  seamen  increased  ability  to  handle  ships  under 
difficult  conditions,  and  they  improved  the  speed  of  the 
whole  fleet. 

Captain  Elias  Hasket  Derby,  of  Salem,  was  perhaps  the 
first  American  to  make  a  systematic  study  of  ship  models 
with  a  view  of  increasing  speed.  He  established  a  ship- 
yard near  his  wharf  at  Salem;  with  untrammelled  mind 
he  made  experiments,  and  eventually  he  built  4  ships  of 
from  300  to  360  tons'  burden,  each  of  which  became  noted 
for  strength  and  speed.  One  of  them  (the  Astra,  a  vessel 
less  than  100  feet  long),  while  on  her  way  to  the  Baltic, 
made  the  run  from  Salem  to  the  Irish  coast  in  eleven  days. 
In  1783  this  vessel  crossed  from  Salem  to  France  in  18  days, 
and  she  made  the  passage  home  in  19. 

Only  a  few  ships  remained  in  commission  to  float  the 
flag  of  the  "new  constellation"  at  the  end  of  the  War  of 
the  Revolution,  but  it  was  a  matter  of  no  small  significance 
that  these  ships  were,  on  the  average,  far  superior  to  those 
that  had  formed  the  American  merchant  marine  in  colonial 
days.  Indeed,  they  were  literally  the  best  merchantmen 
in  the  world.  And  the  conditions  under  which  they  w^ere 
to  sail,  though  harrowing  to  the  owners  and  to  all  patri- 
otic Americans,  were  to  maintain  the  standard  of  the  fleet 
for  many  years  to  come. 


CHAPTER   VI 

EARLY    ENTERPRISE    OF    THE    UNITED    STATES    MERCHANT 

MARINE 

WHEN  the  War  of  the  Revolution  came  to  an  end, 
the  territory  of  the  United  States  extended 
along  the  Atlantic  coast  from  Maine  to  Georgia, 
and  westward  over  the  Appalachian  Mountains  as  far  as 
the  Mississippi  River.  The  population,  including  slaves, 
numbered  no  more  than  3,500,000.  The  settlements  have 
usually  been  considered  in  groups  —  those  of  New  England, 
of  the  Middle  states,  of  the  Southern  states,  and,  last  of 
all,  that  most  interesting  group  west  of  the  mountains. 
Virginia,  Massachusetts,  and  Pennsylvania  were  the  most 
populous  states.  Philadelphia,  the  largest  city,  boasted 
a  population  of  42,520  in  the  first  census  year  (1790). 
New  York  was  second,  Boston  third,  Charleston  fourth, 
and  Baltimore  fifth.  Newport  and  Portsmouth,  though 
small,  were  yet  ports  of  importance,  and  so,  too,  was  Salem. 
The  interests  of  the  different  groups  of  population  of 
the  country  were  then  supposed  to  be  in  some  ways  antago- 
nistic. The  Southern  states  produced  tobacco,  rice,  and 
indigo  for  export,  and  had  relatively  few  ships;   wantmg 


EARLY    ENTERPRISE  lOi 

low  freight  rates,  they  expressed,  at  times  later,  the  fear  of 
combinations  between  owners  of  ships  living  elsewhere,  by 
which  rates  would  be  raised.  The  seeming  antagonisms 
were  magnified  by  the  lack  of  means  of  intercourse  be- 
tween them.  While  roads  wide  enough  for  vehicles  had 
been  cut  from  town  to  to\\Ti  near  the  coast  as  far  south  as 
Virginia,  and  a  few  had  been  opened  into  the  interior  along 
the  routes  of  armies  during  the  war,  the  most  comfortable 
way  of  travelling  was  by  water,  and  ships  were  the  only 
means  for  transporting  freight,  save  only  as  some  goods 
were  carried  on  mules  and  wagons  into  the  interior  —  on 
one  route  as  far  as  Pittsburg. 

On  the  whole,  a  bird's-eye  view  of  the  United  States 
showed  a  wilderness,  820,680  square  miles  in  extent,  that 
had  a  line  of  settlements  along  the  coast.  The  political 
condition  of  the  country  was  not  unlike  its  physical  — 
chaotic.  The  thirteen  colonies,  having  thrown  off  alle- 
giance to  the  mother-country,  had  essayed  the  formation  of 
a  ship  of  state,  but  had  created  only  a  raft  of  thirteen  logs, 
if  such  a  simile  may  be  permitted,  which  chafed  each 
other  with  growing  friction.  Congress  was  nominally  the 
executive,  the  legislative,  and  the  judicial  head  of  a  nation, 
but  the  money  it  issued  ceased  to  circulate,  and  the  bonds, 
representing  borrowed  coin  and  war  material,  were  little 
better.  As  a  body,  the  Congress  consisted  of  a  score  or 
so  of  respectable  gentlemen  who  met  in  a  hall  hired  for 
the  purpose,  where  they  expressed  their  opinions  on  mat- 
ters of  international  as  well  as  local  concern,  and  then 


I02     THE    STORY   OF   THE   MERCHANT   MARINE 

begged  the  sovereign  states  to  take  action.  They  had  no 
power  to  do  anything  —  not  even  to  raise  the  money  witti 
which  to  pay  the  rent  of  the  hall  in  which  they  met. 

An  examination  of  the  American  merchant  marine  at 
this  time  shows  that  it  had  fallen  far  below  that  of  the 
colonies.  In  a  communication  to  Congress,  19  ship- 
builders of  Philadelphia  said  (1789)  that  while  they  had 
launched  4500  tons  of  shipping  per  year  before  the  war, 
"it  appears  from  an  average  of  three  years  past  that 
we  have  built  only  to  the  amount  of  1500  tons  annu- 
alh'."  Similar  complaints  were  made  by  the  shipwrights 
of  Charleston,  Baltimore,  and  Boston.  The  Charleston 
communication  was  especial  interesting.     It  said :  — 

"From  the  diminished  state  of  ship  building  in  America, 
and  the  ruinous  restrictions  to  which  our  vessels  are  subject 
m  foreign  ports ;  from  the  distressed  condition  of  our  com- 
merce, languishing  under  the  most  disgraceful  inequalities, 
its  benefits  transferred  to  strangers  .  .  .  who  neither  have 
treaties  with  us  .  .  .  nor  are  friendly  to  our  commerce," 
it  therefore  seemed  necessary  to  ask  Congress  to  consider 
what  ought  to  be  done  in  the  matter  {Afn.  State  Papers, 
VII,  9;  X,  5-6). 

It  will  help  to  a  comprehension  of  the  condition  of  our 
merchant  marine  if  we  recall  once  more  the  feeling  of  the 
English  public  towards  the  colonists  before  the  war. 
While  statesmen  like  Robert  Peel  fostered  the  growth  of 
American  shipping  and  commerce  by  encouraging  them 
in  evading  the  navigation  laws,  the  growth  thus  fostered 


EARLY   ENTERPRISE  103 

roused  a  strong  feeling  of  ill-will  on  the  part  of  many 
patriotic  Englishmen.  This  feeling  was  entirely  natural 
and  unavoidable.  It  was  not  alone  that  the  Americans 
were  well  able  to  compete  with  the  mother-country  for  the 
carrying  trade  of  the  world.  Under  the  influence  of  envi- 
ronment the  Americans  were  developing  into  a  distinct 
people.  The  successful  colonial  was  often  and  perhaps 
usually  self-assertive  and  boastful;  he  was  necessarily 
aggressive.  Then,  too,  he  showed  a  lack  of  deference  in 
the  presence  of  rank  that  seemed  shocking  to  the  nobility. 
Men  who  were  doing  the  world's  work  in  the  American 
wilderness  made  no  efforts  to  conceal  their  contempt  for 
royal  governors,  and  the  influential  part  of  the  people  of 
England  accepted  the  complaining  letters  of  these  baffled 
governors  as  accurate  characterizations  of  the  American 
people.  Because  of  a  sort  of  race  prejudice  thus  produced, 
the  measures  of  the  king,  when  coercion  was  attempted, 
were  heartily  approved  by  the  majority  of  the  English 
people. 

Then,  during  the  war,  the  expelled  American  loyalists 
had  ex  parte  stories  to  tell  that  added  indignation  to  ani- 
mosity. The  successful  American  cruisers  added  to  the 
ill  feeling.  At  the  same  time  the  British  authorities  ob- 
served a  tendency  among  the  foremast  hands  in  the  British 
navy  that  was  not  a  little  alarming.  While  their  navy 
lost,  in  the  years  from  1776  to  1780,  19,788  men  through 
disease  and  battle,  no  less  than  42,069  deserted.  Some 
of  these  deserters  were,  of  course,  Americans  who  had 


104    THE   STORY  OF  THE   MERCHANT   MARINE 

been  impressed,  but  many  a  good  British  tar  learned 
about  the  opportunities  in  the  new  land  and  made  haste 
to  go  to  meet  them. 

In  short,  it  was  through  natural  and  unavoidable  causes 
that  the  influential  Britons  came  to  regard  their  "American 
cousins"  with  a  feeling  of,  say,  intense  animosity  not 
wholly  unmingled  with  apprehension. 

Keeping  in  mind  this  mental  attitude,  recall  the  fact  that 
a  command  of  the  sea  was  then  absolutely  essential  to  the 
well-being  of  the  British  people,  and  further,  that  the  su- 
premacy which  the  British  then  boasted  had  been  obtained, 
and  maintained  for  a  century,  by  good  hard  fighting ;  and 
further  still,  that  many  British  thinkers  had  been  alarmed 
at  such  American  progress  as  had  been  manifested  even  a 
hundred  years  before  the  Declaration  of  Independence. 
Bluntly  stated,  while  the  British  people  had  learned  to 
hate  the  American,  they  suddenly  saw  that  he  alone  had 
shown  an  ability  to  dispute  that  supremacy  upon  the  sea 
which  seemed  absolutely  necessary  for  the  preservation  of 
their  national  existence.  And  as  an  independent  citizen 
of  the  world  he  was  in  a  position  to  force  the  issue.  It 
follows,  therefore,  that  the  British  were  naturally  led  to  do 
all  they  could  to  oppose  all  progress  in  the  United  States. 
The  "  ruinous  restrictions  "  of  which  the  Charleston  ship- 
builders made  mention  were  a  natural  sequence  of  the 
success  of  the  Revolution, 

While  the  British  were  thus  hostile  upon  the  sea  (they 
were  also  holding  American  territory  in  the  West,  and  in- 


EARLY  ENTERPRISE  105 

citing  the  Indians  to  war),  the  French  and  the  Spanish 
were  united  in  an  effort  to  cut  off  all  that  part  of  the  United 
States  wxst  of  the  Appalachians.  For  civilization  was 
then  in  the  primitive  state  where  men,  though  they  talked 
about  international  law,  were  guided  only  by  unenlight- 
ened selfishness,  and  acknowledged  no  other  court  of 
appeal  than  that  afforded  by  the  sword. 

The  story  of  foreign  aggressions  upon  American  ship- 
ping and  commerce  will  be  told  in  the  next  chapter,  but 
by  way  of  illustrating  conditions  in  the  years  following  the 
Revolution,  consider  one  fact  regarding  the  British  work 
of  opposition.  All  American  trade  with  the  British  West 
Indies  was  forbidden,  and  so  strictly  was  this  regulation 
enforced  that  thousands  of  slaves  starved  to  death  in  those 
islands  for  want  of  the  "refuse  fish"  and  other  food  which 
the  planters  had  been  accustomed  to  obtain  from  America ; 
and  even  some  of  the  poorer  white  people  died  for  the 
same  reason. 

Because  of  ruined  industries,  and  of  a  chaotic  government 
at  home,  and  of  the  ruthless  opposition  of  the  nations  of 
Europe,  the  condition  of  the  people  of  the  United  States 
seemed  almost  hopeless.  So  great  was  the  depression  of 
the  seafaring  part  of  the  population,  indeed,  that  even  the 
optimistic  whalers  of  Nantucket  thought  about  removing 
their  industry  to  France,  and  many  of  them  did  migrate. 

And  yet  it  was  in  this  period  of  deepest  gloom  that  the 
American  merchant  marine  first  reached  out  for  the  trade 
of  the  Far  East.     In  the  Journals  of  Congress  for  1784 


io6     THE   STORY   OF   THE   MERCHANT   MARINE 

(p.  Ti^T,)  is  a  paragraph  referring  to  "  a  letter  of  the  23d 
December,  1783,  from  Daniel  Parker,  stating,  that  a  ship 
called  the  'Empress  of  China'  will  shortly  sail  from  New 
York  for  Canton  in  China,  under  the  command  of  Captain 
John  Green,  and  requesting  sea-letters."  ^ 

No  commercial  ventures  to  the  East  Indies  were  made 
in  colonial  days  because,  in  part,  of  the  monopoly  of  the 
East  India  Company,  but  chiefly  because  abundant  profit- 
able employment  for  all  available  capital  was  found  in 
various  trades  nearer  home.  The  fact  that  ships  in  the 
China  trade  very  often  made  cent  per  cent  was,  of  course, 
very  well  known  in  the  colonies,  and  colonial  merchants 
had  a  general  knowledge  of  the  cargoes  suitable  for  that 
trade.     They  knew,   for   instance,   that  ginseng,   a  root 

*  The  sea  letter  given  to  Captain  Green  read  as  follows:  "Most  serene, 
most  puissant,  puissant,  high  illustrious,  noble,  honorable,  venerable,  wise 
and  prudent  emperors,  kings,  republics,  princes,  dukes,  earls,  barons, 
lords,  burgomasters,  councellors,  as  also  judges,  officers,  justiciaries,  and 
regents  of  all  the  good  cities  and  places,  whether  ecclesiastical  or  secular, 
who  shall  see  these  patents  or  hear  them  read: 

"We  the  United  States  in  Congress  assembled,  make  known,  that  John 
Green,  captain  of  the  ship  called  the  Empress  of  China,  is  a  citizen  of  the 
United  States  of  America,  and  that  the  ship  which  he  commands  belongs 
to  citizens  of  the  said  United  States,  and  as  we  wish  to  see  the  said  John 
Green  prosper  in  his  lawful  affairs,  our  prayer  to  all  the  before  mentioned 
and  to  each  of  them  separately,  where  the  said  John  Green  shall  arrive 
with  his  vessel  and  cargo,  that  they  may  please  to  receive  him  with  good- 
ness, and  treat  him  in  a  becoming  manner,  permitting  him  upon  the  usual 
tolls  and  expenses  in  passing  and  repassing,  to  pass,  navigate  and  fre- 
quent the  ports,  passes  and  territories,  to  the  end,  to  transact  his  business 
where  and  in  what  manner  he  shall  judge  proper,  whereof  we  shall  be  will- 
ingly indebted." 

This  letter  was  signed  by  the  president  and  the  secretary  of  Congress. 


EARLY  ENTERPRISE  107 

growing  wild  in  American  forests,  was  highly  valued  in 
China  for  its  supposed  medicinal  qualities.  Accordingly, 
when  the  war  ended,  and  American  ships  were  excluded 
from  such  a  large  part  of  the  trade  which  they  had  enjoyed 
in  former  days,  the  ship-owners  naturally  thought  of  the 
trade  to  the  Far  East.  New  York  and  Philadelphia  mer- 
chants united  in  fitting  out  a  vessel  which  they  renamed 
the  Empress  of  China.  She  measured  360  tons,  and  the 
chief  part  of  her  cargo  was  ginseng.  Sailing  from  New 
York  on  February  22,  1784,  with  the  sea  letter  noted 
above  for  a  passport,  she  arrived  at  Canton  Roads  (Macao) 
on  August  23,  and  she  reached  home  on  May  11,  1785. 
The  profit  on  the  venture  was  $30,000,  which,  being  only 
a  little  more  than  25  per  cent  on  the  investment,  was  con- 
sidered small.  Other  voyages  of  the  period  are  worth 
consideration,  if  only  to  illustrate  the  spirit  of  the  ship- 
owners of  the  day. 

The  most  interesting  of  the  China  voyages,  in  this  point 
of  view,  was  that  of  the  sloop  Experiment,  a  vessel  with 
one  mast  and  a  capacity  for  eighty  tons  of  cargo,  that  was 
built  at  Albany  for  the  trade  of  the  Hudson  River.  Cap- 
tain Stewart  Dean,  her  master,  had  served  in  two  privateers 
during  the  Revolution.  She  carried  six  cannon,  with 
a  liberal  supply  of  small  arms,  and  her  crew  numbered 
fifteen  (one  account  says  twenty),  men  and  boys.  "Mar- 
tial music  and  the  boatswain's  whistle  were  heard  on  board 
with  all  the  pomp  and  circumstance  of  war."  She  carried 
out  ginseng  and  brought  back  tea  and  silks,  with  profit; 


io8     THE   STORY   OF   THE   ISIERCHANT  MARINE 

and  what  is  of  more  importance,  perhaps,  in  this  story  is 
the  fact  that  she  made  the  return  voyage  in  four  months 
and  twelve  days.  The  record  shows  what  a  fore-and-aft 
rig  can  do  in  a  round-the-world  voyage. 

In  the  same  year  a  Hingham  sloop  of  only  forty  tons, 
commanded  by  a  Captain  Hallett,  sailed  from  Boston, 
bound  for  Canton,  but  got  as  far  only  as  the  Cape  of  Good 
Hope.  At  that  point  English  ship  captains  offered 
Captain  Hallett  two  pounds  of  good  tea  for  each  pound  of 
ginseng  he  carried,  and  he  was  willing  to  take  the  profit 
thus  insured  rather  than  risk  a  longer  voyage  in  the  hope 
of  a  larger  one. 

The  story  of  the  entrance  of  Elias  Hasket  Derby,  of 
Salem,  into  the  China  trade  is  of  interest  because  of  the 
view  it  affords  of  a  peculiarity  of  most  of  the  successful 
ship-owners  of  the  day.  Derby  considered  the  possi- 
bilities of  the  trade  as  early  as  any  one,  but  while  the 
Empress  of  China  was  on  her  way  to  Canton,  Derby  sent 
his  Grand  Turk  as  far  as  the  Cape  of  Good  Hope  only. 
By  trading  ginseng  and  provisions  to  the  English  captains 
who  were  found  at  the  Cape,  Captain  IngersoU,  com- 
manding the  Grand  Turk,  was  able  to  make  a  fair  profit 
on  the  voyage;  but  the  main  object  in  view  was  to  learn 
all  about  the  demands  of  the  Canton  trade;  and  in  this 
he  was  entirely  successful.  It  may  be  w^orth  mentioning 
that  Captain  IngersoU  also  went  up  the  coast  of  Africa  to 
complete  his  cargo  with  gold-dust,  ivory,  etc.,  and  that 
he  was  under  orders  not  to  take  on  slaves,  even  though  he 


^/A/f  %y/^t^. 


From  ;i  print  in  tht-  possi-ssion  of  the  Iaiiox  Library 


EARLY   ENTERPRISE  109 

should  thereby  be  able  to  make  a  paying  voyage  out  of  a  los- 
ing one.  Elias  Hasket  Derby  was  one  of  the  few  individ- 
uals who  were  far  enough  ahead  of  their  age  to  see  the  in- 
iquity of  the  trade,  but  the  important  feature  of  the  story  of 
the  voyage  is  this,  that  Derby  would  take  the  risks  of  the  voy- 
age to  the  Cape  to  obtain  information.  In  the  meantime,  too, 
he  sent  one  of  his  sons  to  Europe,  where  he  spent  several 
months  in  a  study  of  the  India  trade  of  England  and  France. 

With  the  knowledge  thus  gained,  Captain  Derby  de- 
spatched the  Grand  Turk  (December  5,  1785)  on  a  voyage 
to  the  Far  East,  but  instead  of  sailing  direct  to  Canton  she 
called  at  the  Isle  of  France  (Mauritius) ;  then  she  went 
to  the  coast  of  India,  and  thence  to  Canton.  The  trade 
at  Mauritius  and  on  the  Indian  coast  added  greatly  to 
the  profits  of  the  voyage  without  increasing  the  length  of 
time  required  to  a  serious  extent. 

The  trade  to  China  thus  initiated  was  so  profitable  that 
in  1789  no  less  than  fifteen  American  ships  were  in  the 
Canton  roads,  of  which  four  belonged  to  Captain  Derby. 
One  of  the  four  is  worth  especial  notice.  She  was  the 
swift  Astra,  Captain  James  Magee,  Jr.,  commanding,  and 
Thomas  Handyside  Perkins,  supercargo.  More  than 
twenty  individual  ventures  were  made  in  this  voyage  of 
the  AstrcB,  and  a  few  notes  from  her  outward  manifest 
(list  of  cargo)  will  serve  well  to  show  the  course  of  trade  in 
those  days.  Thus  Tenney  and  Brown,  of  Newbury,  sent 
"9  kegs  snuff,"  and  a  note  in  the  margin  of  the  manifest 
tells  Captain  Magee  that  "  ^  the  net  proceeds  you  are  to 


no    THE   STORY   OF   THE   MERCHANT   MARINE 

credit  E.  H.  D.'s  account  for  freight — the  other  |  to  lay 
out  on  account  of  T.  &  B.  in  h'ght  goods."  Opposite 
the  item  "  i  phaeton  and  harness  complete,  with  saddles 
and  bridles  &c.,  cased  up"  is  a  note  saying:  "This 
belongs  to  Folger  Pope  .  .  .  the  net  proceeds  is  to  be 
credited  to  E.  H.  D.'s  account,  as  friend  Derby  is  to  have 
the  use  of  the  money  for  freight."  David  Seas  sent 
"Boxes  containing  $15,000,  16  casks  ginseng,  5570  lbs. 
This  at  one-fifth  for  freight."  William  Cabot  sent  a  box 
"containing  21  pieces  plate,  weight  255  oz.  16  dwts. 
12  gr."  Rum,  wines,  beer,  fish,  flour,  "598  firkins  butter 
32,055  lbs,"  and  spermaceti  candles  were  conspicuous 
items  in  the  manifest. 

Some  quotations  from  Derby's  letter  of  instructions 
to  the  captain  and  supercargo  are  also  interesting. 
"Make  the  best  of  your  way  for  Batavia,  and  on  your 
arrival  there  you  will  dispose  of  such  a  part  of  the  cargo 
as  you  think  may  be  most  for  my  interest.  I  think  you 
had  best  sell  a  few  casks  of  the  most  ordinary  ginseng  if 
you  can  get  one  dollar  a  pound  for  it.  If  you  find 
the  price  of  sugar  to  be  low  you  will  then  take  into  the 
ship  as  much  of  the  best  white  kind  as  will  floor  her, 
and  fifty  thousand  weight  of  coffee,  if  it  is  low  as  we  have 
heard,  .  .  .  and  fifteen  thousand  of  salt  petre,  if  it  is  very 
low,  some  nutmegs,  and  fifty  thousand  weight  of  pepper; 
this  you  will  store  in  the  fore  peak  for  fear  of  injuring  the 
teas.  The  sugars  will  save  the  expense  of  any  stone  bal- 
last, and  it  will  make  a  floor  for  the  teas  &:c.  at  Canton. 


EARLY   ENTERPRISE  III 

At  Batavia  you  must,  if  possible,  get  as  much  freight  for 
Canton  as  will  pay  half  or  more  of  your  charges.  .  .  . 
You  must  endeavor  to  be  the  first  ship  with  ginseng,  for 
be  assured  you  will  do  better  alone  than  you  will  if  there 
are  three  or  four  ships  at  Canton  at  the  same  time  with  you." 
As  another  of  the  Derby  ships  was  to  be  at  Batavia  on  the 
arrival  of  the  Astrce,  directions  were  given  for  the  loading 
or  the  sale  of  that  vessel,  according  as  circumstances  seemed 
to  require,  but  special  stress  is  laid  upon  the  necessity  of 
making  careful  calculations  before  selling  the  vessel,  in 
order  to  be  sure  that  that  course  would  pay  better  than 
bringing  her  home  full  of  cargo.  It  is  manifest  that  Derby 
did  not  care  to  sell  her.  "  Captain  Magee  and  Mr.  Perkins 
are  to  have  5  per  cent  commission  for  the  sales  of  the 
present  cargo,  and  2h  per  cent  on  the  cargo  home,  and  also 
5  per  cent  on  the  profit  made  on  goods  that  may  be  pur- 
chased at  Batavia  and  sold  at  Canton,  or  in  any  other  simi- 
lar case  that  may  arise  on  the  voyage.  They  are  to  have 
one-half  the  passage  money  —  the  other  half  belongs  to 
the  ship.  The  privilege  of  Capt.  Magee  is  5  percent  of 
what  the  ship  carries  on  cargo  exclusive  of  adventures. 
The  property  of  Mr.  Perkins,  it  is  understood,  is  to  be  on 
freight,  which  is  to  be  paid  for  like  other  freighters.  It  is 
orders  that  the  ship's  books  shall  be  open  to  the  inspection 
of  the  mates  and  doctor  of  the  ship,  so  they  may  know  the 
whole  business"  in  case  of  the  death  of  captain  or  super- 
cargo. "The  Philadelphia  beer  is  put  up  so  strong  that 
it  will  not  be  approved  until  it  is  made  weaker;  you  had 


112     THE   STORY   OF   THE   MERCHANT   MARINE 

best  try  some  of  it.  .  .  .  The  iron  is  English  weight;  .  .  . 
there  is  four  percent  you  will  gain  if  sold  Dutch  weight. 
.  .  .  You  are  not  to  pay  any  moneys  to  the  crew  while 
absent  from  home,  unless  in  case  of  real  necessity,  and  then 
they  must  allow  an  advance  for  the  money.  ...  It  is 
likewise  my  order  that  in  case  of  your  sickness  that  you 
write  a  clause  at  the  foot  of  these  orders  putting  the  com- 
mand of  the  ship  into  the  person's  hands  that  you  think 
the  most  equal  to  it,  not  having  any  regard  to  the  station 
he  at  present  has  in  the  ship.  .  .  .  Lay  out  for  my  ac- 
count fifteen  or  twenty  pounds  sterling  in  curiosities." 

The  sale  of  the  Astra  is  forbidden  for  this  voyage,  but  "  if 
at  Batavia  or  Canton  you  can  agree  to  deliver  her  the  next 
season  for  $20,000  or  $25,000  you  may  do  it."  The  final 
paragraph  says  that  while  the  orders  are  "a  little  particu- 
lar" "you  have  leave  to  break  them  in  any  part  where 
you  hy  calculation  think  it  for  my  interest." 

As  there  were  fifteen  American  ships  at  Canton  when 
\heAstrcB  was  there,  the  market  was  flooded  with  American 
goods.  Her  ginseng  sold  for  $20,000  less  than  prime  cost. 
Two  of  Derby's  ships  were  sold;  the  other  two  brought 
home  728,871  pounds  of  tea.  Although  the  consumption 
of  the  country  at  that  time  was  only  about  a  million  pounds 
a  year,  the  total  imports  of  the  year  amounted  to  2,601,852 
pounds.  In  the  meantime  the  government  had  been 
organized  under  the  Constitution  and  a  duty  levied  on  im- 
ports which,  in  the  case  of  the  Astra,  amounted  to  about 
$27,000.     On  the  face  of  the  documents  the  voyage  of  the 


EARLY   ENTERPRISE  II3 

Asfr(B  was  disastrous.  But  Derby,  by  petition,  obtained 
the  privilege  of  putting  his  goods  in  the  warehouse  and  pay- 
ing the  duty  as  they  were  sold  and  removed.  The  system 
of  bonded  warehouses  became  common  later.  And  ac- 
cording to  the  biography  of  Captain  Derby,  published  in 
Hunt's  Merchants^  Magazine,  his  capital  was  not  impaired 
seriously,  if  at  all,  by  the  voyage. 

Another  merchant  who  reached  out  for  trade  in  strange 
seas  was  Captain  Ebenezer  Parsons,  who  sent  ships  to  the 
Red  Sea,  took  on  cargoes  of  coffee  for  Smyrna,  and  cleared, 
in  some  voyages,  from  300  to  400  per  cent.  A  still  larger 
profit  was  made  by  Captain  Jonathan  Carnes,  of  Salem,  in 
a  number  of  ventures  to  Sumatra.  While  at  Bencoolen, 
on  that  island,  he  learned  by  accident  that  pepper  grew 
wild  on  its  uncivilized  northwest  coast.  Returning  to 
Salem,  Carnes  imparted  his  information  to  Jonathan  Peele, 
who  at  once  furnished  the  money  with  which  a  schooner 
named  the  Rajah  was  built.  Carnes  armed  the  Rajah 
with  four  guns,  shipped  a  crew  of  ten  men,  loaded  her  with 
brandy,  gin,  tobacco,  bar  iron,  and  dried  fish,  and  then,  in 
November,  1795,  cleared  out  for  the  East  Indies.  These 
proceedings  aroused  the  greatest  curiosity  in  Boston  as  well 
as  Salem ;  for  neither  owner  nor  captain  would  say  a  word 
about  the  destination  of  the  schooner;  and  this  curiosity 
grew,  as  the  months  passed  and  nothing  was  heard  from 
the  Rajah.  Accordingly,  when,  after  eighteen  months, 
the  schooner  came  sailing  into  port  loaded  to  the  hatch 
coamings  with  pepper,  she  created  more  excitement  in 
I 


114     THE   STORY   OF   THE   MERCHANT  MARINE 

Salem  than  any  other  vessel  that  entered  the  port  that  year. 
The  profit  on  this  voyage  amounted  to  700  per  cent.  When 
the  Rajah  was  fitted  for  a  second  voyage  in  the  same 
secret  manner,  a  number  of  merchants  sent  other  vessels 
in  chase,  hoping  to  find  where  she  obtained  her  pepper ;  but 
Captain  Carnes  eluded  them  all,  and  once  more  brought 
home  a  cargo  at  an  immense  profit.  In  the  third  voyage, 
however,  his  secret  buying  place  was  discovered,  and  there- 
after he  had  to  be  contented  with  the  ordinary  cent  per 
cent. 

One  of  the  most  celebrated  voyages  of  the  period  was 
that  of  the  ship  Columbia,  Captain  John  Kendrick,  with 
the  sloop  Washington,  Captain  Robert  Gray,  as  a  tender, 
to  the  northwest  coast  of  the  continent  to  trade  for  furs. 

The  Columbia  was  a  ship  of  240  tons'  burden.  She 
could  just  carry  the  cargo  of  an  Erie  canal  boat  of  the  size 
in  use  in  1909.  The  expedition  was  fitted  out  by  Joseph 
Barrell  and  four  others.  It  sailed  on  October  i,  1787,  and 
arrived  at  Nootka  Sound  in  September,  1788.  On  July  3, 
1789,  Captain  Gray  sailed  for  home  in  the  Columbia; 
and,  returning  by  the  way  of  China  and  the  Cape  of  Good 
Hope,  was  the  first  to  sail  around  the  world  under  the 
American  flag.  The  work  done  by  these  two  captains  is 
chiefly  of  interest  here,  however,  because  of  the  discov- 
eries made  on  the  coast  and  of  the  use  the  nation  made  of 
the  discoveries  later.  For  the  Strait  of  Juan  de  Fuca  and 
adjoining  waters  were  thoroughly  explored,  the  Columbia 
River  was  discovered,  and  its  navigable  waters  were  ex- 


EARLY   ENTERPRISE  115 

plored.  Land  was  purchased  of  the  Indians,  forts  were 
built,  and  a  vessel  called  the  Adventurer  (of  40  tons' 
burden)  was  launched.  The  claim  thus  established  by 
American  citizens  was  used  with  effect,  when  it  had  been 
made  good  by  subsequent  occupation  of  the  land,  in  set- 
tling the  boundary  between  the  United  States  and  the 
British  possessions  to  the  north  thereof. 

The  trade  on  the  northwest  coast  was  continued  by 
Boston  people  with  varying  results  until  after  the  War  of 
1812,  and  many  interesting  stories  have  been  related  by 
those  engaged  in  it.  John  Ledyard,  the  American  travel- 
ler, was  first  to  suggest  engaging  in  it.  He  was  with  Cap- 
tain Cook,  when  that  celebrated  explorer  was  on  the  north- 
west coast,  and  learned  that  the  sea-otter  skins,  which  the 
Indians  had  in  abundance,  could  be  sold  for  $120  each  in 
China.  On  returning  home,  he  almost  succeeded  in  getting 
Robert  Morris  to  enter  the  trade,  but  nothing  was  done  in 
it  until  the  Columbia  sailed. 

The  voyage  of  the  Columbia  did  not  pay  her  owners, 
but  those  who  followed  her  often  made  large  profits.  Per- 
haps the  most  interesting  venture  was  one  made  by  Will- 
iam Sturgis.  While  trading  with  the  Indians  (blankets, 
cutlery,  firearms,  molasses,  and  trinkets  were  then  in  de- 
mand), he  learned  that  the  Indians  used  the  skin  of  the 
ermine  in  its  winter  coat  as  a  currency,  and  that  it  was 
highly  valued.  Accordingly,  Sturgis  sent  home  a  fine 
specimen  of  the  ermine  skin,  and  ordered  as  many  as  could 
be   obtained.     His    correspondent   secured    5000   at   the 


Ii6    THE   STORY   OF   THE   MERCHANT   MARINE 

Leipsic  fair,  and  on  the  next  voyage  Sturgis  carried  them 
to  the  coast,  where  he  traded  five,  which  had  been  purchased 
for  thirty  cents  each,  for  a  sea-otter  skin.  He  thus  ob- 
tained a  thousand  sea-otter  skins,  which  he  sold  in  China 
for  $50  each,  or  $50,000  for  that  part  of  the  venture  alone. 
Mr.  Sturgis,  in  a  lecture  delivered  in  Boston,  on  January  21, 
1846,  said  that  he  had  known  of  a  capital  of  $40,000  yield- 
ing a  return  of  $150,000  in  that  trade,  and  in  one  voyage 
"  an  outfit  not  exceeding  $50,000  gave  a  gross  return  of 
$284,000." 

In  the  meantime  Captain  Derby's  young  supercargo 
on  the  AstrcB,  Thomas  H.  Perkins,  had  established  a  trad- 
ing house  in  Canton.  He  entered  the  northwest  coast  trade 
with  success,  and  in  the  course  of  twenty-two  years  his  ships 
made  thirty  round-the-world  voyages  from  Boston,  by  the 
way  of  the  Horn,  the  northwest  coast.  Canton,  and  the  Cape 
of  Good  Hope.  It  is  an  interesting  fact  that  in  the  years 
immediately  following  the  War  of  1812  "all  the  supplies 
for  the  British  [fur-buying]  establishments,  west  of  the 
Rocky  Mountains,  were  brought  from  London  to  Boston, 
and  carried  thence  to  the  mouth  of  the  Columbia  in  Ameri- 
can ships;  and  all  their  collections  of  furs  were  sent  to 
Canton  consigned  to  an  American  house,  and  the  proceeds 
shipped  to  England  or  the  United  States  in  the  same  ves- 
sels."    {Hunt's  Magazine,  XIV,  538.) 

In  connection  with  the  stories  that  have  been  told  of  these 
voyages  to  the  Far  East,  consider  the  following  facts  in  the 
biography  of  Captain  Nathaniel  Silsbee:  — 


EARLY  ENTERPRISE  117 

"Among  the  officers  who  rose  most  rapidly  to  distinction 
in  the  service  of  Mr.  Derby,  none  is  more  prominent  than 
the  Hon.  Nathaniel  Silsbee,  late  Senator  from  IMassa- 
chusetts.  His  father  had  enjoyed  the  entire  confidence  of 
Mr.  Derby,  and  after  his  death  Mr.  Derby  transferred  that 
confidence  to  his  son. 

"In  1790  he  appears  as  the  mate  and  captain's  clerk  of 
a  small  vessel  bound  to  Madeira.  In  1792  [when  but 
nineteen  years  old]  he  is  master  of  a  sloop  in  the  trade  to 
the  West  Indies,  which  Mr.  Derby  impowers  him  to  sell  for 
$350.  In  1793,  at  the  early  age  of  twenty  years,  he  is  on  a 
voyage  to  the  Isle  of  France  in  command  of  the  new  ship 
Benjamin,  of  142  tons.  From  the  Isle  of  France  he  pro- 
ceeds to  the  Cape  of  Good  Hope,  returns  to  the  Isle  of 
France,  and  brings  his  ship  home  with  large  profits. 

"In  1796  Mr.  Derby  dispatches  him  in  the  ship  Benja- 
min to  Amsterdam  and  thence  to  the  Isle  of  France,  with 
a  credit  of  $10,000  for  his  own  private  adventure.  After 
selling  his  ship  and  cargo  at  a  great  profit  he  purchases  a 
new  ship  of  450  tons  for  his  owner  and  returns  to  Salem  with 
a  full  cargo  of  East  India  goods  for  his  owner,  and  such 
favorable  results  for  himself  as  to  enable  him  to  commence 
business  on  his  own  account,  in  which  he  soon  achieved 
fortune." 

When  Silsbee,  at  the  age  of  twenty,  was  master  of  the 
Benjamin,  on  the  way  to  the  Isle  of  France,  his  first  mate, 
Charles  Derby,  was  nineteen  years  old,  and  his  second 
mate,  Richard  J.  Cleveland,  was  only  eighteen.     In  1799 


Ii8     THE   STORY   OF   THE   MERCHANT   MARINE 

this  Cleveland  made  a  voyage  in  a  fifty-foot  sloop  from 
Canton  to  the  northwest  coast  of  America,  and,  though 
hampered  by  a  mutinous  crew,  he  secured  there  a  cargo 
of  furs  which  sold,  on  his  return  to  Canton,  for  $60,000. 
The  outfit  had  cost  him  $9000. 

Although  all  ships  of  the  day  were,  by  modem  standards, 
dangerous  in  size  and  rig;  though  scurvy  was  the  plague 
of  crews  in  long  voyages;  though  vast  breadths  of  the  sea 
had  never  been  explored,  and  the  wild  coasts  visited  had 
never  been  charted;  although  the  first  voyages  were  made 
when  the  American  people  were  financially  prostrate  and 
the  symbol  of  the  American  government  was  utterly  power- 
less, not  only  in  home  affairs  but  in  the  face  of  the  open  and 
covert  enmity  of  the  leading  commercial  nations  of  the 
world,  —  in  spite  of  all  this,  the  American  ship-owners 
reached  out  for  the  commerce  of  all  the  earth,  and  young 
men  having  ambition  and  ability  worked  their  way  to  the 
command  of  ships  before  they  were  old  enough  to  vote. 

The  picture  of  one  of  those  boyish  sea-captains  flinging 
the  Stars  and  Stripes  to  the  breeze  on  the  far  side  of  the 
earth  portrays,  better  than  anything  ever  said,  written,  or 
done,  the  spirit  of  America. 


CHAPTER   VII 

FRENCH   AND   OTHER   SPOLIATIONS 

ON  July  25, 1785,  while  the  schooner  Maria, Captain 
Isaac  Stevens,  of  Boston,  was  sailing  past  Cape 
St.  Vincent,  on  the  southwest  corner  of  Spain,  she 
was  captured  by  an  armed  ship  from  Algiers,  and  carried 
to  that  port.  Five  days  later  the  ship  Dauphin,  Captain 
Richard  O'Brien,  of  Philadelphia,  when  fifty  leagues  west 
of  Lisbon,  suffered  a  similar  fate.  These  vessels  with  their 
cargoes  were  confiscated,  and  the  crews,  numbering  twenty- 
one  men  all  told,  were  sold  into  slavery. 

In  connection  with  these  facts  consider  a  quotation  from 
Lord  ShefReld's  Observations  on  the  Commerce  of  the 
United  States,  published  in  1784;  — 

"  It  is  not  probable  that  the  American  States  will  have 
a  very  free  trade  in  the  Mediterranean  ;  it  will  not  be  the 
interest  of  any  of  the  great  maritime  powers  to  protect 
them  from  the  Barbary  states.  They  cannot  protect 
themselves  from  the  latter;  they  cannot  pretend  to  a 
navy." 

It  will  now  be  instructive  to  recall  a  letter  written  by 
Edward  Church,  American  consul  at  Lisbon,  on  October 

119 


120    THE   STORY   OF   THE   MERCHANT   MARINE 

12,  1793,  in  regard  to  the  Algerine  pirates.  Portugal  had 
been  protecting  her  trade  from  the  Algerines  by  means  of 
war-ships,  and  had  incidentally  afforded  convoy  to  such 
American  merchantmen  as  needed  it  in  those  waters. 
Having  learned  that  a  number  of  Algerine  corsairs  had  gone 
cruising  in  the  Atlantic,  Consul  Church  went  to  the  Portu- 
guese Minister  of  Foreign  Affairs  to  learn  why  the  Portu- 
guese war-ships  had  allowed  them  to  leave  the  Mediter- 
ranean. The  minister  replied  that  Charles  Logic,  British 
consul  at  Algiers,  acting  under  orders  from  the  British  gov- 
ernment, had  concluded  a  treaty  of  peace  between  Algiers 
and  Portugal.  Portugal,  he  said,  had  not  authorized  such 
a  treaty,  nor  had  she  been  consulted  as  to  the  terms.  The 
British  government  had  guaranteed  the  execution  of  the 
treaty,  and  the  payment  of  the  tribute  that  it  called  for, 
however,  and  with  the  British  to  aid  them  the  pirates  had 
gone  forth  to  prey  on  commerce.  Church,  with  more  at- 
tention to  accuracy  than  diplomatic  language,  termed  the 
arran.^ement  thus  made  a  "hellish  conspiracy"  against 
American  shipping. 

A  brief  account  of  the  Algerine  pirates  will  now  prove 
interesting.  For  time  out  of  mind  the  people  of  the  north 
coast  of  Africa  lived  by  piracy,  but  it  was  not  until  the  sea- 
faring outlaws  of  Europe  taught  them  to  build  and  handle 
large  ships  that  they  became  really  menacing  to  commerce. 
While  the  English  were  fighting  the  Dutch  in  the  middle 
of  the  seventeenth  century,  they  were  obliged  to  send 
Blake  with  twenty-five  well-armed  ships  to  overawe  these 


FRENCH   AND   OTHER   SPOLIATIONS  121 

pirates.  In  1672  another  squadron  was  sent  for  the  same 
purpose.  These  two  squadrons  proved  that  it  was  easy 
and  inexpensive  to  crush  the  power  of  the  pirates;  but  in- 
stead of  continuing  to  use  their  navy  to  protect  their 
merchantmen,  the  British  made  no  further  attacks  upon 
the  pirates  until  181 6.  Indeed,  instead  of  crushing  their 
power,  the  British  government  adopted  the  policy  of  add- 
ing to  their  means  of  destroying  commerce.  And  in  this 
policy  several  European  powers  soon  joined. 

Secretary  of  State  Jefferson,  in  a  report  on  "Mediter- 
ranean Trade,"  dated  December  30,  1790,  said  that  Spain 
paid  "from  three  to  five  million  dollars  to  Algiers"  in  one 
lump  to  induce  the  Dey  to  make  "  peace."  France  in  1788 
had  paid  an  unknown  sum  in  hand,  and  had  since  paid 
an  annual  subsidy  of  $100,000  for  immunity  from  attack. 
Great  Britain  paid  an  annual  subsidy  of  60,000  guineas  to 
the  four  Barbary  powers.  Portugal  alone  of  the  European 
maritime  powers  used  her  fleet  to  protect  her  trade.  In 
addition  to  the  regular  subsidies,  the  powers  named  made 
presents  to  the  Barbary  chiefs,  and  these  presents  included 
usually,  if  not  always,  armed  ships  and  other  war  material. 

The  reason  for  paying  subsidies  instead  of  fighting  is 
most  interesting.  It  was  done  to  encourage  the  pirates  to 
ravage  the  shipping  belonging  to  the  rivals  of  the  subsidy 
payers. 

In  1793  England  was  at  war  with  France.  America 
was  the  leading  neutral  maritime  nation.  The  British 
statesmen  saw  that  the  American  shipping  would  secure 


122     THE   STORY   OF   THE   MERCHANT   MARINE 

much  of  the  trade  in  the  Mediterranean  which  English 
ships  had  been  doing,  unless  checked  promptly  by  some 
extraordinary  means,  and  it  was  to  administer  this  check 
that  the  pirates  were  loosed  upon  the  Atlantic. 

The  injury  done  to  our  shipping  in  the  raid  mentioned 
above  was  insignificant,  save  only  as  the  story  gives  em- 
phasis totheother  facts  given  —  facts  which  show  the  stateof 
civilization  among  the  most  enlightened  nations  of  Europe. 
The  state  of  American  civilization,  at  the  time,  is  shown 
by  the  treaty  made  with  the  pirates,  under  which  we 
agreed  to  pay  them  tribute ;  for  it  was  tribute  and  not  sub- 
sidy as  in  our  case.  We  paid  it  in  war  material,  too,  as 
shown  by  the  following  extract  from  the  Life  of  General 
William  Eaton,  who,  in  1798,  was  American  consul  at 
Tunis :  — 

"On  the  2 2d  of  December  ]\Ir.  Eaton  .  .  .  went  on 
board  the  U.S.  brig  Sophia,  Capt.  Henry  Geddes,  com- 
mander, bound  to  Algiers;  in  company  with  the  Hero, 
a  ship  of  350  tons  burden,  loaded  with  naval  stores  for  the 
Dey  of  Algiers ;  the  Hassan  Bashaii',  an  armed  brig  of  275 
tons,  mounting  eight  6-pounders,  destined  to  Algiers ;  the 
Skjoldahrand,  a  schooner  of  250  tons,  16  double  fortified 
4-pounders,  destined  to  Algiers;  and  the  La  Eisha,  of  150 
tons,  14  4-pounders,  also  destined  to  Algiers.  All  these 
vessels  excepting  the  Sophiawcre  to  be  delivered  to  the  Dey 
of  Algiers,  for  arrearages  of  stipulation  and  present  dues." 

With  these  facts  in  mind  we  shall  be  able  to  comprehend 
why  American  shipping  was  subjected  to  ruthless  spolia- 


A.N   Iv\Ki.\    I'UM'.  Ill    C'i.ii'I'i:k  Smi':  .l/.l/v7.l,  oi'  Xi;w   Hi'-.di-okd, 
Built   1782 


FRENCH  AND  OTHER  SPOLIATIONS 


123 


tions  during  the  entire  period  between  the  end  of  the  War 
of  the  Revolution  and  our  second  war  for  liberty,  which  we 
began  in  181 2.  The  sole  criterion  of  right  in  international 
affairs  was  might. 

As  the  reader  remembers,  the  French  spoliations  grew 
out  of  the  anarchy  prevailing  during  the  French  Revolution. 
To  appreciate  the  facts,  one  needs  to  put  himself  in  the  place 
of  the  French  people  and  feel  not  only  their  aspirations  but 
their  blinding  indignation.  A  well-meaning,  most  ener- 
getic, and  (more  or  less)  hysterical  National  Convention 
displaced  an  impotent  monarchy.  "  Of  the  11,210  decrees 
passed  by  the  Convention  one-third  have  a  political  aim, 
two-thirds  have  a  humanitarian  aim."  (Hugo,  in  Ninety- 
Three.)  The  surrounding  nations,  alarmed  lest  republican 
principles  gain  headway  among  the  "common  people," 
formed  a  coalition  to  avenge  the  death  of  the  French  king 
and  destroy  the  French  Republic.  England,  without 
declaring  war,  held  in  her  ports  all  merchantmen  (includ- 
ing neutrals)  bound  for  France,  and  then  began  to  capture 
and  send  into  port  all  neutral  ships  found  at  sea  with  car- 
goes of  food  for  French  consignees.  It  was  then  that 
France  began  to  strike  back  in  a  way  that  affected  American 
shipping.  In  March  and  April,  1793,  our  Minister  at  Paris 
had  to  complain  of  several  ships  captured  by  French 
privateers,  and  in  one  of  his  letters  to  the  French  Minister 
of  Foreign  Affairs  he  said:  — 

"I  avoid  troubling  you  with  the  afflicting  recital  of  the 
violences   committed   on   those   different  occasions,   and 


124     THE   STORY    OF    THE   MERCHANT   MARINE 

which  were  so  much  the  less  excusable  inasmuch  as  they 
took  place  after  the  prizes  were  taken  possession  of,  and 
when  no  resistence  was  met  with." 

On  May  9,  1793,  the  French  government  authorized  the 
seizure  of  "  all  neutral  vessels  which  shall  be  laden  wholly  or 
in  part"  with  food  products  and  "destined  for  an  enemy's 
port." 

The  decree  was  contrary  to  the  treaties  made  between 
France  and  the  United  States  in  1778,  but  it  was  confirmed 
on  the  27th  of  July. 

This  decree  was  avowedly  made  because  food  was  scarce 
in  France  and  because  England  was  trying  to  starve  the 
French  into  submission  by  stopping  all  food-laden  ships 
bound  for  France.  In  the  French  view  it  was  justified  as  a 
measure  of  necessity. 

On  July  2,  1796,  however,  it  was  decreed  that  "the 
flag  of  the  French  Republic  will  treat  neutral  vessels  either 
as  to  confiscation,  as  to  searches  or  capture  in  the  same 
manner  as  they  shall  suffer  the  English  to  treat  them." 

In  the  meantime  the  United  States  had  made,  under 
duress,  a  treaty  with  England  (Jay's,  1794),  which  gave 
the  English  advantages  of  which  the  French,  though  by 
treaty  our  allies,  were  deprived ;  and  this  treaty  was  rati- 
fied in  spite  of  the  fact  that  the  British  aggressions  had  ex- 
ceeded the  French  not  only  in  extent,  but  in  their  aggravat- 
ing character.  Moreover,  this  treaty  was  not  promulgated 
until  May  9,  1796,  and  France  justly  complained  of  the 
concealment  as  disingenuous.     It  was  partly  because  of 


FRENCH   AND   OTHER   SPOLIATIONS  125 

the  resentment  thus  created  that  the  decree  of  July  2,  1796, 
was  made,  and  it  was  wholly  because  of  resentment  that, 
on  March  2, 1797,  a  decree  was  issued  declaring  that  "every 
American  vessel  shall  be  a  good  prize  which  has  not  on 
board  a  list  of  the  crew  in  proper  form,  such  as  is  presented 
by  the  model  annexed  to  the  treaty  of  the  6th  February, 
1778." 

No  American  vessel  had  carried  this  role  d'equipage 
since  the  end  of  the  War  of  the  Revolution;  the  decree 
was  passed  with  the  intention  of  driving  all  American  ships 
from  the  sea.  Then,  as  a  final  thrust  at  America,  it  was  de- 
creed that,  October  29, 1799,  American  sailors  found  serving 
on  the  ships  of  enemies  should  be  treated  as  pirates,  and  that 
they  should  not  be  allowed  to  plead  in  extenuation  that 
they  had  been  impressed. 

The  following  stories  of  French  aggressions  illustrate 
well  the  usual  course  of  life  at  sea  in  American  ships 
during  the  period  under  consideration :  — 

In  1796  the  French  privateer  Flying  Fish  came  to  Phila- 
delphia, purchased  supplies,  and  made  repairs.  In  the 
meantime  her  captain,  aided  by  the  French  consul,  ob- 
tained information  about  all  the  ships  then  loading  with 
valuable  cargoes  for  foreign  ports.  With  these  facts  in 
hand  the  captain  then  went  to  the  Capes  of  the  Delaware, 
waited  until  one  of  the  most  valuable  of  the  American 
ships  passed  out  to  sea,  and  then  captured  her  and  turned 
her  crew  adrift  in  a  small  boat. 

In  the  same  year,  while  the  American  ship  Hare  was 


126     THE   STORY   OF   THE   MERCHANT   MARINE 

lying  in  London,  with  a  valuable  cargo  on  board,  her  cap- 
tain went  to  Paris  and  arranged  with  the  French  Minister 
of  Marine  to  bring  her  into  French  waters  and  have  her  con- 
demned as  a  prize  to  him  as  captor.  And  this  bargain  was 
carried  out. 

Some  Philadelphia  merchants  fitted  out  a  vessel  named 
Les  Jumeaux  as  a  French  privateer.  When  going  to  sea 
she  drove  off  a  revenue  cutter  that  tried  to  stop  her,  and  she 
finally  made  a  prize  of  a  vessel  belonging  to  neighbors  of 
her  owner. 

The  brigantine  Patty,  Captain  Josiah  Hempsted,  be- 
longing to  Justus  Riley,  of  Wethersfield,  Connecticut,  was 
captured  while  on  her  way  to  St.  Bartholomew,  on  July  31, 
1796.  When  Captain  Hempsted  appeared  before  the 
"special  agent  "  (a  sort  of  governor  and  judge  in  admiralty) 
ruling  at  Guadaloupe,  that  official  shook  his  fist  under  the 
captain's  nose,  and  said :  — 

"I  have  confiscated  your  vessel  and  cargo,  you  damned 
rascal." 

The  French  frigate  Thetis,  having  captured  the  brigan- 
tine Eliza,  of  New  York,  a  seaman  named  Henry  Doughty, 
a  native-born  citizen  of  Boston,  was  placed  with  a  number 
of  English  sailors  who  had  been  captured,  and  was  then  de- 
livered to  the  British  in  exchange  for  French  sailors.  Us- 
ing American  sailors  in  effecting  exchanges  became  a  com- 
mon practice  with  the  French  naval  commanders. 

The  crews  of  American  vessels  taken  to  the  West  Indies 
were  commonly  turned  ashore  without  clothing  (except 


FRENCH   AND   OTHER   SPOLIATIONS  127 

what  they  were  wearing),  or  food,  or  means  of  procuring 
either.  On  November  10,  1797,  seven  captured  American 
vessels  were  lying  at  Petit  Guave,  three-fourths  of  the 
crews  of  which  had  died  because  of  the  hardships  they  had 
suffered  when  thus  turned  ashore.  In  some  cases  the 
crews  were  imprisoned.  Captain  Breard,  of  the  schooner 
Zephyr,  of  Portsmouth,  who  ventured  to  go  on  board  the 
privateer  that  had  captured  him  and  there  beg  for  a  little 
of  the  food  of  which  he  had  been  robbed,  was  thrown  over 
the  rail.  Captain  Codwise,  of  the  brig  Glasgow,  was 
thrown  into  prison  at  Leogane  and  kept  for  thirty-six  hours 
without  food. 

A  more  cheerful  picture  of  the  life  at  sea  in  American 
ships  at  that  time  is  found  in  a  letter  (written  in  1799)  from 
Captain  Elias  Hasket  Derby,  Jr.,  to  his  father.  The  young 
man  was  in  command  of  the  Salem  ship  Mount  Vernon,  and 
he  had  arrived  at  Gibraltar  after  a  passage  of  seventeen 
and  a  half  days. 

"  The  first  of  our  passage  was  quite  agreeable ;  the  latter, 
light  winds,  calm,  and  Frenchmen  constantly  in  sight  for 
the  last  four  days.  The  first  Frenchmen  we  saw  was  off 
Tercira  —  a  lugger  to  the  southward.  Being  uncertain  of 
his  force  we  stood  by  him  to  leeward  on  our  course  and  soon 
left  him.  July  28th,  in  the  afternoon,  we  found  ourselves 
approaching  a  fleet  of  upwards  of  fifty  sail,  steering  nearly 
N.  E.  We  run  directly  for  their  center;  at  4  o'clock 
found  ourselves  in  their  half-moon;  concluding  it  impos- 
sible that  it  could  be  any  other  than  the  English  fleet,  con- 


128     THE   STORY   OF   THE   MERCHANT   MARINE 

tinued  our  course  for  their  center  to  avoid  any  apprehen- 
sion of  a  want  of  confidence  in  them.  They  soon  dis- 
patched an  i8-gun  ship  from  their  center,  and  two  frigates, 
one  from  their  van  and  another  from  their  rear,  to  beat 
towards  us  —  we  being  to  windward.  On  approaching 
the  center  ship  under  easy  sail  I  fortunately  bethought 
myself  that  it  would  be  but  common  prudence  to  steer  so 
far  to  windward  of  him  as  to  be  a  grapeshot's  distance 
from  him,  to  observe  his  force  and  maneuvering.  When 
we  were  abreast  of  him  he  fired  a  gun  to  leeward  and 
hoisted  English  colors.  We  immediately  bore  away  and 
meant  to  pass  under  his  quarter,  between  him  and  the  fleet 
showing  our  American  colors.  This  movement  discon- 
certed him,  and  it  appeared  to  me  he  either  conceived  we 
were  either  an  American  sloop  of  war,  or  an  English  one  in 
disguise,  attempting  to  cut  him  off  from  the  fleet ;  for  while 
we  were  in  the  act  of  wearing  on  his  beam  he  hoisted  French 
colors  and  gave  us  a  broadside.  We  immediately  brought 
our  ship  to  the  wind,  and  stood  on  about  a  mile  —  wore 
towards  the  center  of  the  fleet  —  hove  about  and  crossed 
him  on  the  other  tack,  about  half  grapeshot  distance,  and 
received  his  broadside;  several  shot  fell  on  board  of  us 
without  much  damage.  All  hands  were  active  in  clear- 
ing ship  for  action,  for  our  surprise  had  been  complete. 
In  about  ten  minutes  we  began  firing  our  stem  chasers 
and  in  a  quarter  of  an  hour  gave  him  our  broadside  in 
such  style  as  evidently  sickened  him,  for  he  immediately 
luffed  in  the  wind,  gave  us  his  broadside,  went  in  stays 


FRENCH   AND   OTHER   SPOLIATIONS  129 

in  great  confusion,  wore  ship  afterwards  in  a  large  circle, 
and  renewed  the  chase  at  a  mile  and  a  half  distance  — 
a  maneuver  calculated  to  keep  up  appearances  with  the 
fleet  and  escape  our  shot. 

"  At  midnight  we  had  distanced  them;  the  chasing  rocket 
signals  being  almost  out  of  sight.  We  have  been  in  con- 
stant brushes  ever  since.  The  day  after  we  left  the  fleet 
we  were  chased  till  night  by  two  frigates,  whom  we  lost 
sight  of  when  it  was  dark.  The  next  morning  off  Cape 
St.  Vincent,  were  chased  by  a  French  lateen-rigged  vessel, 
apparently  10  or  12  guns,  one  of  them  an  i8-pounder. 
We  brought  to  for  him,  [but]  his  metal  was  too  heavy  for 
ours,  and  his  position  to  windward.  .  .  .  [As]  it  was  not 
in  my  power  to  cut  him  off  we  of  course  bore  away  and 
saluted  him  with  our  long  nines.  He  continued  his  chase 
till  dark,  and  when  we  were  nearly  by  Cadiz,  at  sunset, 
he  made  a  signal  to  a  consort  whom  we  had  just  discovered 
ahead.  Having  a  strong  breeze  I  was  determined  to  pass 
my  stem  over  him  if  he  did  not  make  way  for  me.  He 
thought  prudent  to  do  so.  At  midnight  we  made  the 
lights  in  Cadiz  city,  but  found  no  English  fleet.  After 
lying  to  till  daylight  concluded  that  the  French  must  have 
gained  the  ascendancy  in  Cadiz  and  thought  prudent  to 
proceed  to  this  place,  where  we  arrived  at  12  o'clock, 
popping  at  Frenclimcn  all  the  forenoon.  At  10  a.m.,  off 
Algesiras  Point,  were  seriously  attacked  by  a  large  lateener 
who  had  on  board  more  than  100  men.  He  came  so  near 
our  broadside  as  to  allow  our  6-pound  grape  to  do  cxccu- 

K 


130     THE   STORY   OF   THE   MERCHANT  MARINE 

tion  handsomely.  We  then  bore  away  and  gave  him  our 
stern  guns  in  a  cool  and  deliberate  manner,  doing  ap- 
parently great  execution.  Our  bars  having  cut  his  sails 
considerably,  he  was  thrown  into  confusion,  struck  both 
his  ensign  and  his  pennant.  I  was  then  puzzled  to  know 
what  to  do  with  so  many  men.  Our  ship  was  running 
large,  with  all  her  steering  sails  out,  so  that  we  could  not 
immediately  bring  her  to  the  wind;  and  we  were  imme- 
diately off  Algesiras  Point,  from  which  I  had  reason  to 
fear  she  might  receive  assistance,  and  my  port,  (Gibraltar) 
in  full  view.  These  circumstances  induced  me  to  give 
up  the  gratification  of  bringing  him  in.  It  was,  however, 
a  satisfaction  to  flog  the  rascal  in  full  view  of  the  English 
f^eet  who  were  to  leeward.  The  risk  of  sending  here  is 
great  indeed  for  any  ship  short  of  our  force  in  men  and 
guns  —  but  particularly  [when  short  of]  heavy  guns. 
Two  nines  are  better  than  six  or  eight  sixes,  and  two  long 
twelves  do  better  than  twenty  sixes.  ...  I  have  now, 
while  writing  to  you,  two  of  our  countrymen  in  full  view 
who  are  prizes  to  these  villains.  Lord  St.  Vincent,  in 
a  50-gun  ship,  is  in  the  act  of  retaking  one  of  them.  The 
other  goes  into  Algesiras  without  molestation." 

Spain  took  scores  of  American  ships,  and  when  the  French 
privateers  carried  an  American  ship  into  a  Spanish  port, 
the  Spanish  officials  invariably  assisted  in  the  robbery. 
The  other  nations  robbed  in  proportion  to  their  power  and 
opportunity.  The  third  volume  of  our  Foreign  Rela- 
tions contains  a  list  of  fifty-one  American  ships  that  were 


FRENCH  AND  OTHER  SPOLIATIONS 


131 


carried  into  the  ports  of  Denmark  and  Sweden.  The 
French  aggressors  were  inspired  primarily,  as  said,  by 
indignation;  the  Engh'sh  were  acting  in  defence  of  their 
maritime  supremacy,  as  shall  appear  further  on,  but  these 
smaller  powers  of  Europe  were  animated  by  no  other 
motive  than  that  of  the  Algerine  pirates. 

As  to  the  total  of  the  damages  suffered  from  the  French 
republicans,  it  must  be  said  that  no  complete  calculation 
was  ever  made.  But  documents  written  under  oath  show 
that  more  than  600  ships  were  despoiled  before  the  year 
1800,  and  that  losses  amounting  to  more  than  $20,000,000 
were  sustained.  These  losses  included  ships  and  cargoes 
only;  incidental  losses  due  to  the  conditions  at  sea  could 
not  be  measured. 

Though  really  a  part  of  our  naval  history,  perhaps  it 
may  be  worth  adding  that  when,  at  last,  our  naval  ships, 
though  few  in  numbers  and  small  in  size,  were  ordered  to 
sea  to  protect  our  trade ,  no  more  than  three  or  four  well- 
fought  actions  were  needed  to  bring  the  French  Republic 
spoliations  to  an  end.  It  was,  and,  unhappily,  it  is  yet, 
in  human  nature  to  despise  any  appeal  to  altruistic  notions 
of  right  in  an  effort  to  secure  justice,  but  all  accord  hearty 
respect  to  him  who  is  able  and  willing  to  fight  for  his  rights. 
We  were  amused  by  the  antics  of  the  Japanese  as  a  nation 
of  artists ;  we  took  off  our  hats  and  stood  erect  with  our 
heels  together  in  the  presence  of  the  heroes  of  the  Battle 
of  the  Yellow  Sea. 


CHAPTER   VIII 


THE  BRITISH  AGGRESSIONS 


BEFORE  considering  the  aggressions  of  the  British 
government  upon  our  shipping  during  the  period 
between  the  Revolution  and  the  War  of  1812,  it 
seems  still  more  necessary  than  it  was  in  the  case  of  the 
French  to  try  to  get  the  point  of  view  of  the  aggressor. 
The  men  who  governed  England  were  placed  in  power  not 
only  to  guard  but  to  promote  English  interests  against 
those  of  all  other  nations.  Patriotism  and  natural  ambi- 
tion inspired  them  to  do  this  as  fully  as  possible.  The 
welfare  of  the  nation  being  in  their  charge,  it  was  their 
duty  to  consider  first  of  all  entire  safety  from  invasion, 
as  everybody  believed  then,  and  believes  now,  that  safety 
depended  upon  the  supremacy  of  the  nation  upon  the 
high  seas.  To  maintain  that  supremacy  every  Briton  felt 
obliged  to  make  every  needed  sacrifice.  Small  wonder, 
then,  that  in  maintaining  that  supremacy  the  rulers  of 
England  should  have  felt  obliged  to  hamper  all  possible 
rivals  for  that  supremacy.  The  state  of  public  mind  at 
the  end  of  a  century  wherein  England  had  been  at  war 
four  years  for  every  three  of  peace  demanded  that  the 
British  supremacy  at  sea  be  maintained  at  any  cost;    and 

132 


THE   BRITISH   AGGRESSIONS 


^33 


the  morality  of  the  world  has  not  even  yet  reached  a  con- 
dition where  an  English  patriot  can  feel  sentiments  differ- 
ing greatly  from  those  of  the  end  of  the  eighteenth  century. 

At  the  beginning  of  the  twentieth  century,  civilized 
nations  acknowledge  certain  rules  of  national  conduct 
called  international  law,  but  at  the  end  of  the  eighteenth 
nothing  of  the  kind  had  any  real  weight  in  regulating 
international  affairs.  Men  quoted  Vattel  in  their  corre- 
spondence, but  the  one  recognized  rule  contained  three 
words  only,  "Alight  makes  right."  Practical,  not  al- 
truistic, considerations  controlled  all  negotiations,  and 
no  nation  had,  or  could  expect  to  maintain,  any  "right^' 
which  it  was  unwilling  to  support  by  force.  It  was  the 
duty  of  neutral  powers  to  build  ships  of  the  line,  or  meekly 
suffer  the  consequences.  The  facts  of  history  support  no 
statement  more  fully  than  this,  that  American  shipping 
suffered  from  spoliations,  between  1783  and  181 2,  solely 
because  they  begged,  instead  of  fighting,  for  that  freedom 
of  the  sea  which  they  claimed  as  a  natural  right. 

As  an  introduction  to  the  story  of  the  British  aggres- 
sions, here  are  a  few  extracts  from  letters  written  by  one 
Phineas  Bond,  a  native-born  American  who  served  Eng- 
land as  consul  at  Philadelphia,  beginning  in  1787.  The 
letters  were  written  either  to  the  British  Secretary  of  State 
for  Foreign  Affairs,  or  to  one  of  the  under  secretaries. 
(See  An.  Rep.  Am.  Hist.  Asso.,  1894.) 

On  February  21,  1787,  in  referring  to  an  act  of  Parlia- 
ment relating  to  the  registry  of  English  ships,  Bond  said 


134     THE   STORY  OF  THE   MERCHANT   MARINE 

that  "  if  properly  pointed  it  must  inevitably  cramp  the 
remnant  of  commerce  now  enjoyed  by  this  country."  He 
is  confident  that  the  "alarm  and  perplexity"  which  the 
act  occasioned  in  America,  prove  that  it  will  be  beneficial 
to  British  shipping. 

On  May  17  Bond  said  that  the  American  ships  from 
China  were  bringing  home  more  goods  than  the  country 
could  use,  and  that  the  surplus  was  shipped  to  Europe, 
where  it  would  undersell  the  goods  of  the  British  East 
India  Company.  By  the  use  of  bribes  (he  speaks  plainly 
of  bribing  officials),  he  obtained  copies  of  the  manifests  of 
all  American  ships  from  China,  and  forwarded  them  to 
England.     Then  on  July  2  he  wrote :  — 

"This  country  is  so  restricted  by  the  regulations  of 
trade  of  other  nations  .  .  .  and  so  weak  are  the  resources 
of  the  merchants  here,  that  if  an  early  check  or  restraint  can 
be  thrown  in  their  way,  either  by  thwarting  their  credit 
or  by  withholding  the  articles  suitable  to  their  commerce, 
they  would  never  rally;  and  then,  my  Lord,  they  would 
be  confined  to  their  coasting  trade  and  to  illicit  com- 
munication with  the  Spaniards:  These  come  in  a  secret 
manner  into  the  ports  of  America  and  bring  specie  to  a 
large  amount  .  .  .  the  amount  of  specie  is  enormous 
...  at  least  500,000  dollars  were  brought  into  this  port 
last  year."  To  take  away  this  trade  with  the  Spaniards 
Bond  advised  the  "establishing  of  a  free  port  in  the  Ba- 
hamas .  .  .  from  which  the  Spaniards  could  draw  the 
supplies  they  want." 


THE  BRITISH  AGGRESSIONS  135 

In  a  letter  dated  September  29  Bond  took  a  look  ahead : 
"The  rumor  of  war  has  inspired  the  Americans  with  new 
spirits:  they  anticipate  the  benefits  of  a  free  trade,  and 
already  calculate  upon  the  profits  of  being  the  carriers 
to  all  the  belligerent  powers." 

In  a  letter  dated  November  20  Bond  tells  "of  two  per- 
sons, natives  of  England  who  with  great  resolution  and 
no  small  personal  risque  purchased  here  and  reshipped 
to  Liverpool  three  machines  for  spinning  cotton  and  a 
machine  for  carding  cotton  for  spinning."  The  machines 
had  been  brought  from  Liverpool  "clandestinely  .  .  . 
packed  in  queensware  crates."  They  were  bought  by 
the  "  natives  of  England  "  and  reshipped  to  Liverpool  in 
order  to  hinder  the  establishment  of  a  cotton-spinning 
industry  in  the  United  States. 

Bond  said  he  did  not  "apprehend"  that  any  such  fac- 
tories would  be  "speedily  brought  to  a  state  of  Rivalship 
with  those  of  Gt.  Britain,"  but  it  was  "fit  to  guard 
against  an  evil  which  tho'  at  present  in  its  infancy," 
might  grow  in  time. 

In  several  letters  Bond  urged  that  restrictions  be  placed 
upon  passenger-carrying  ships  leaving  England  for  the 
United  States,  "  Under  color  of  a  humane  provision  for  the 
comfort  of"  emigrants,  in  order  to  stop  or  at  least  "dis- 
courage" all  emigrants,  and  especially  mechanics,  likely 
to  be  of  value  in  developing  the  industries  of  the  United 
States. 

Of  especial   interest  is  the  warning  which   Bond  sent 


136     THE   STORY   OF   THE   MERCHANT  MARINE 

when  he  learned  that  the  British  government  considered 
the  propriety  of  admitting  American  vessels  of  limited  size, 
(seventy  tons  was  offered  later),  into  the  trade  of  the 
British  West  Indies.     He  said :  — 

"Any  indulgence  of  this  sort  would  certainly  divert  the 
trade  out  of  its  present  channel  —  the  people  of  New 
England  are  an  enterprising  people,  the  number  of  their 
ports  and  the  locality  of  their  situation  favor  the  increase 
of  seamen.  They  navigate  their  vessels  frugally  and  their 
outfits  are  infinitely  less  expensive  than  the  outfits  of  Brit. 
vessels.  When  once  admitted  to  trade  with  the  W.  India 
Islands,  ship  building  which  has  lain  dormant,  almost, 
and  which  was  formerly  a  source  of  great  profit  to  this 
country,  would  instantly  be  revived  —  America  would 
soon  monopolize  the  advantages  of  carrying;  limited  as 
to  size  the  numbers  of  her  vessels  would  be  increased,  and 
by  increasing  the  numbers  would  supply  the  means  of 
conveying  all  the  produce  of  America  which  is  consumed 
in  our  islands,  and  that,  too,  at  a  much  cheaper  rate  than 
any  other  nation  could  afford.  But  the  enterprising  spirit 
of  the  people  of  New  England  would,  as  soon  as  they 
found  the  channels  of  profit  open,  be  exerted  to  the  raising 
a  maritime  force  which  in  case  of  future  war  might  operate 
very  detrimentally  to  the  interests  of  England." 

That  Bond  was  encouraged  in  this  kind  of  work  appears 
from  the  fact  that  he  was  promoted  later.  There  was  no 
detail  of  American  business  too  small  to  escape  the  care- 
ful attention  of  the  British  government  in  its  efforts  to 


THE   BRITISH   AGGRESSIONS  137 

throw  what  Bond  called  an  "early  check  or  restraint" 
upon  all  American  progress,  and  especially  upon  the 
prosperity  of  American  shipping. 

A  comparison,  brielly  made,  of  the  laws  and  regulations 
of  England  and  the  United  States  follows :  — 

The  British  prohibited  American  vessels  from  entering 
the  ports  of  their  West  India  Islands,  Canada,  and  other 
American  possessions,  and  their  East  India  spice  market. 
We  admitted  British  vessels  into  all  our  ports  on  payment 
of  a  tonnage  tax  of  fifty  cents  per  ton  (our  ships  paid  six 
cents  per  ton),  and  goods  brought  in  British  ships  paid 
a  revenue  duty  of  10  per  cent  more  than  goods  in  ours. 

In  the  treaty  made  in  1794  the  British  offered  to  let  our 
vessels  of  no  more  than  seventy  tons  enter  their  West 
Indies  on  condition  that  we  would  admit  British  ships 
of  any  size  on  payment  of  the  same  tax  and  duty  as  our 
own. 

The  British  imposed  double  lighthouse  taxes  on  Ameri- 
can vessels  bound  to  any  port  in  England  except  London. 
We  imposed  no  extra  lighthouse  dues. 

British  merchants  were  prohibited  from  using  Ameri- 
can-built vessels  in  a  number  of  trades.  We  allowed  our 
merchants  to  use  British-built  vessels  in  any  trade  on  pay- 
ment of  the  extra  dues  mentioned  above. 

The  British  prohibited  the  importation  of  goods  by 
American  vessels  from  every  country  except  the  United 
States,  We  permitted  the  British  vessels  to  bring  us  goods 
from  all  countries. 


138     THE   STORY  OF  THE   MERCHANT  MARINE 

The  British  prohibited  the  importation  of  some  of  our 
agricultural  products  during  specified  periods  of  time, 
and  of  some  at  all  times.  We  admitted  the  importation 
of  all  British  agricultural  products  at  all  times. 

An  American  citizen  was  not  allowed  to  import  some 
goods  into  some  ports  of  the  British  domain,  even  in  British 
ships.  In  other  ports  an  extra  tax  was  laid  on  the  Ameri- 
can. We  permitted  the  British  citizen  to  import  all  goods 
into  all  our  ports,  and  we  laid  no  extra  tax  upon  him. 

The  British  prohibited  the  consumption  of  certain 
American  articles  the  importation  of  which  they  per- 
mitted. We  did  not  prohibit  the  consumption  of  any 
British  article. 

The  British  prohibited  the  importation  of  American 
goods  from  all  countries  except  the  United  States.  We 
permitted  the  importation  of  British  goods  from  all 
countries. 

Consul  Bond,  in  a  letter  (April  19,  1789),  to  Lord 
Carmarthen,  berated  Mr.  Madison  because  "he  by  no 
means  adverts  to  that  important  consideration,  that  so 
great  indulgence  has  been  granted  by  Gt.  Britain  to  the 
United  States." 

Omitting  for  want  of  space  any  account  of  many  pre- 
vious attacks  upon  American  shipping,  it  may  be  said  that 
the  first  made  in  connection  with  the  war  upon  the  French 
Republic  was  the  order  to  British  warships  on  June  8, 
1793,  to  "detain  all  vessels  laden  wholly  or  in  part  with 
corn,  flour  or  meal"  bound  to  any  French  port.     It  was 


THE   BRITISH   AGGRESSIONS  139 

provided  that  each  ship  so  captured  should  be  restored, 
but  the  cargo  was  to  be  confiscated  for  the  account  of 
the  British  government,  which  was  to  pay  for  it  the  invoice 
cost  with  10  per  cent  added.  This  order  was  issued  osten- 
sibly to  starve  the  French  republicans  into  submission  to  the 
old  monarchy,  but  it  was  well  known  that  no  such  result 
could  follow  because  France  had  never  depended  upon 
the  United  States  for  any  part  of  its  bread  worth  mention. 
Thus,  in  1792,  when  we  exported  546,913  bushels  of  wheat 
to  Great  Britain  and  her  possessions,  France  took  only 
54  bushels.  The  order,  therefore,  had  some  other  object 
in  view,  and  the  brief  story  of  the  ship  Neptune,  Captain 
Jeffries,  is  instructive  at  this  point.  When  the  Nepiune  was 
captured  under  this  order,  she  was  restored  as  soon  as  con- 
venient to  do  so,  and  an  order  was  issued  for  the  payment 
of  the  invoice  price  of  her  cargo  with  10  per  cent  added. 
The  addition  of  10  per  cent  for  profit  seemed  at  first  glance 
to  be  an  effort  to  act  with  some  degree  of  fairness,  but  as 
a  matter  of  fact  the  owners  were  deliberately  robbed;  the 
market  price  of  wheat  in  England,  at  that  time,  was  very 
much  higher  than  the  invoice  price  with  10  per  cent 
added,  and  Captain  Jeffries  pleaded  for  permission,  not 
to  go  on  to  the  port  for  which  he  had  been  sailing  (where 
the  price  was  still  higher),  but  for  permission  to  sell  the 
grain  to  merchants  there  in  London,  who  were  anxious 
to  give  the  market  price;  but  the  government  insisted 
on  taking  it  at  the  mere  advance  of  10  per  cent. 

We  may  suppose  that  Captain  Jeffrics's  failure  to  be 


I40     THE   STORY   OF   THE   MERCHANT   MARINE 

satisfied  with  a  profit  of  lo  per  cent  was  considered  a 
plain  illustration  of  American  avarice. 

On  November  6,  1793,  British  cruisers  were  ordered 
to  capture  all  neutral  ships  laden  with  the  produce  of  the 
French  West  Indies.  American  ships  were  carrying  im- 
mense quantities  of  those  goods,  and  all  the  larger  because 
they  were  excluded  from  the  British  West  Indies.  To 
make  certain  of  a  clean  sweep  of  these  American  ships,  the 
order  in  council  was  kept  secret  for  several  weeks  in  order 
to  give  the  British  cruisers  time  enough  to  get  on  the 
ground  and  take  everything  unawares.    (H.  Adams,  II,  322.) 

On  January  8,  1794,  this  order  was  changed  so  as  to 
permit  American  ships  to  carry  the  French  colonial  produce 
to  American  ports,  but  the  direct  trade  to  Europe  was  still 
forbidden.  In  the  meantime  more  than  200  American 
vessels  had  been  captured  and  confiscated  under  the 
original  order. 

While  American  ships  were  forbidden  to  carry  French 
colonial  goods  from  the  colonies  direct  to  France,  they  were, 
as  said,  yet  allowed  to  carry  the  produce  to  the  United 
States  and  then  reexport  it  to  Europe,  provided  it  was 
entered  in  the  American  port,  landed,  and  all  duties,  etc., 
paid  before  the  voyage  was  continued.  In  the  case  of 
the  Polly,  decided  April  29,  1800,  Sir  William  Scott  (Lord 
Stowell),  confirmed  this  right  of  American  ships,  and  the 
American  minister  "succeeded  in  obtaining  from  Pitt 
an  express  acceptance  of  this  rule."  One  may  note  that 
this  concession  was  obtained  immediately  after  our  war- 


THE  BRITISH   AGGRESSIONS  141 

ships  had  been  sent  to  protect  our  merchantmen  from  the 
aggressions  of  the  French;  the  guns  of  the  Constellation 
had  been  heard  in  London,  so  to  speak. 

When,  on  April  29,  1803,  England  declared  war  upon 
Napoleon,  however,  a  new  administration  had  been  in- 
augurated in  the  United  States,  and  all  Europe  knew  that 
no  use  would  be  made  of  such  American  war-ships  as  re- 
mained in  commission.  Accordingly,  as  a  first  measure 
to  hamper  the  American  ships  in  their  effort  to  become 
carriers  for  the  beleaguered  French,  two  British  frigates 
were  sent  to  Sandy  Hook  to  detain  and  search  all  ships 
for  property  belonging  to  the  French.  American  waters 
were  occupied  for  the  purpose  of  hampering  American 
trade.  In  the  course  of  the  blockade  thus  established,  a 
British  gunner,  just  for  a  joke,  fired  a  shot  at  a  coaster, 
aiming  so  as  to  frighten  the  crew.  The  man  at  the  coaster's 
helm  was  killed. 

This  invasion  of  American  waters  was  a  fair  notice  of 
the  British  determination  to  compel  the  United  States  to 
abide  by  all  English  laws  and  orders  in  council  made  for 
the  protection  of  British  shipping.  By  refusing  to  declare 
war,  the  American  administration  justified  the  aggressors. 

Then  the  British  government,  still  further  to  promote 
British  trade  and  shipping,  adopted  Phineas  Bond's 
advice,  and  established  free  ports  in  the  West  Indies,  to 
which  small  unarmed  traders  from  the  colonies  of  the 
enemy  were  invited  to  come  and  buy  British  goods.  These 
free  ports  were  supplied  by  British  ships  under  convoy. 


142     THE   STORY   OF   THE   MERCHANT   MARINE 

In  the  meantime  preparations  were  made  to  deprive 
the  Americans  of  the  indirect  trade  from  the  French  colonies 
by  way  of  the  United  States  to  Europe.  On  July  23,  1805, 
Sir  William  Scott,  reversing  his  decision  in  the  case  of 
the  Polly,  decided  that  a  ship  called  the  Essex  was  a  good 
prize,  although  in  a  voyage  from  Bordeaux  she  had  called 
at  Salem,  discharged  cargo,  made  repairs,  and  reloaded 
before  heading  away  for  a  West  India  port. 

The  all-influential  British  na\7  had  joined  in  with  the 
British  ship-owner  to  demand  that  the  American  ships 
should  be  excluded  from  all  trade  between  the  colonies  of 
the  enemy  and  Europe.  The  ship-owners  demanded  it 
because  the  American  ship,  in  spite  of  the  great  expense  of 
the  indirect  voyage,  was  yet  able  to  take  the  trade  from  the 
British,  even  though  they  were  supported  by  free  ports  and 
other  aids.  The  demand  made  by  or  for  the  British  naval 
officers  was  unique.  When  voiced  by  one  James  Stephens 
{War  in  Disguise;  or  the  Frauds  of  the  Neutral  Flags), 
he  pictured  a  British  admiral  grown  old  and  full  of  honors 
in  the  service,  who,  in  spite  of  his  honors,  had  been  unable 
"to  wrest  [from  the  enemy]  the  means  of  comfortably 
sustaining  those  honors."  As  long  as  American  ships 
were  allowed  to  engage  in  the  indirect  trade,  the  naval 
officer  would  have  to  "look  in  vain  for  any  subject  of  safe 
and  uncontested  capture."  If  American  ships  were  ex- 
cluded, they  would  still  take  chances,  and  they  would  then 
be  captured  without  danger  and  condemned  without  contest. 

Mere  mention  need  be  made  of  the  British  practice  of 


THE   BRITISH   AGGRESSIONS  143 

taking  American  sailors  from  American  ships  and  com- 
pelling them  to  serve  in  British  war-ships.  Many  Ameri- 
can merchantmen  were  left  short-handed  upon  the  high 
seas,  and  there  is  no  doubt  that  some  of  them  were,  for 
this  reason,  lost  with  all  hands.  The  practice  was  main- 
tained as  one  method  of  depressing  our  navigation,  but 
the  subject  seems  to  belong  to  our  naval  histories. 

Brief  space  will  serve  for  a  consideration  of  the  various 
orders  in  council  and  paper  blockades  issued  and  laid  in 
1806  and  1807.  In  May,  1806,  the  British  declared  that 
the  European  coast  "from  the  river  Elbe  to  the  port  of 
Brest  inclusive  .  .  .  must  be  considered  as  blockaded." 
No  blockading  fleet  was  maintained.  In  reply  to  this 
Napoleon  issued  his  Berlin  decree  declaring  the  British 
islands  "in  a  state  of  blockade,  "  and  that  "all  commerce 
and  correspondence  with  the  British  Islands  is  prohibited." 

The  French  navy  was  unable  to  go  to  sea;  Napoleon 
had  only  a  few  privateers  with  which  to  enforce  his  decree, 
but  the  British  used  it  as  an  excuse  for  the  order  in  council 
of  January  7,  1807,  by  which  no  vessel  was  "permitted 
to  trade  from  one  port  to  another  both  which  ports  shall" 
be  so  far  under  the  control  of  the  enemy  '^  that  British 
vessels  may  not  trade  freely  thereat^ 

"If  we  may  not  no  one  else  shall."  The  chief  influ- 
ence of  this  order  upon  American  vessels  was  to  interdict 
their  trade  as  coasters  in  Europe,  and  to  prevent  their 
seeking  a  cargo  in  another  port  when  they  failed  to  find 
one  in  the  first  port  entered. 


144    THE   STORY   OF   THE   MERCHANT   MARINE 

The  order  in  council  of  November  ii,  1807,  was  issued 
partly  because,  as  it  stated,  that  the  one  of  January  7  had 
failed  to  induce  Napoleon  to  withdraw  his  Berlin  decree, 
and  because  no  neutral  power  had  declared  war  upon  him 
because  of  that  failure.  The  chief  reason  for  issuing  it 
however  (and  this  was  also  plainly  declared),  was  ''for 
supporting  that  maritime  power  which  the  exertions  and 
valor  of  his  [the  British  king's]  people  have,  under  the 
blessing  of  Providence  enabled  him  to  establish  and  main- 
tain." To  this  end  all  the  ports  from  which  "  the  British 
flag  is  excluded"  were  declared  in  a  state  of  blockade. 
"Maritime  power"  meant  "merchant  marine." 

The  principal  ports  of  the  world  to  which  American 
vessels  had  been  accustomed  to  trade,  having  thus  been 
closed  with  a  paper  blockade,  they  were  all  reopened  again 
on  condition  that  the  trade  to  them  be  carried  on  by  way 
of  England.  On  the  25  th  of  the  month  it  was  further 
provided  that  the  ships  thus  trading  by  way  of  England 
were  to  land  their  cargoes  in  the  English  port  visited. 

This  placed  the  ships  of  the  United  States  in  the  con- 
dition endured  by  American  vessels  in  colonial  days 
when  goods  purchased  in  Europe  had  to  be  carried  to 
an  English  port  and  "laid  on  shore"  before  they  were 
taken  to  America.  Some  writers  have  supposed  that  this 
was  done  as  a  step  toward  returning  the  United  States 
once  more  to  the  position  of  colonies.  The  fact  is  that 
the  rulers  of  England  had  found  that  they  could  not  ex- 
clude American  ships  altogether  from  the  sea,  and  they  had 


THE   BRITISH   AGGRESSIONS  145 

determined,  therefore,  to  make  them  serve  British  interests 
as  far  as  possible  —  first  by  carrying  British  goods  to  the 
ports  from  which  British  ships  were  excluded,  and  second, 
by  making  them  pay  a  tribute  by  landing  their  cargoes  in 
English  ports.  Practically  the  United  States  was  thus 
made  a  vassal  of  England. 

In  reply  to  this  order  Napoleon  decreed  that  any  ship 
that  should  in  any  way  submit  to  or  take  advantage  of 
it  should  be  good  prize. 

The  dates  of  the  several  orders  in  council  and  decrees 
are  of  some  interest  because  these  show  that  the  British 
began  the  series  by  the  paper  blockade  from  the  Elbe  to 
Brest.  But  the  chief  interest  is  in  the  fact  that  the  orders 
were  all  issued  for  the  benefit  of  British  trade.  The  talk 
found  in  various  histories  about  "retaliation"  and  Eng- 
land's "death  struggle  with  tyranny"  was  all  sham. 
Said  Spencer  Percival,  in  a  frank  speech  in  Parliament, 
(March  3,   1812):  — 

"The  object  of  the  orders  in  council  was  not  to  destroy 
the  trade  of  the  continent  but  to  force  the  continent  to 
trade  with  us." 

"I  am  of  the  opinion,"  said  Lord  Hawkesbury,  "that 
some  decisive  measure  in  support  of  our  own  commerce 
...  is  become  indispensable,  not  merely  as  a  measure 
of  commercial  policy,  hut  in  order  to  put  the  contest  in 
which  we  are  engaged  upon  its  true  grounds ^  (Quoted 
by  H.  Adams,  IV,  90.) 

But  while  England  strove  by  every  means  to  preserve 


146    THE    STORY   OF    THE    MERCHANT   MARINE 

her  trade  and  shipping  at  the  expense  of  her  American  rival, 
and  Napoleon,  with  motives  no  higher  than  those  of  a 
highwayman,  confiscated  American  ships  and  cargoes  to 
the  value  of  $10,000,000,  the  American  merchant  marine 
prospered. 

On  December  31,  1789,  ships  of  an  aggregate  capacity 
of  123,893  tons  were  registered  under  the  American  flag 
for  foreign  trade.  In  1792  the  tonnage  registered  was 
411,438.  In  1793,  the  first  year  of  extensive  spoliations, 
the  tonnage  was  reduced  to  367,734,  but  thereafter,  in 
spite  of  the  fact  that  Americans  were  obliged  to  fight  their 
way  through  swarming  enemies,  our  shipping  grew  until 
in  1800  we  made  boast  of  the  possession  of  667,107 
tons  in  the  foreign  trade.  Further  than  that,  British 
shipping  aggregating  115,000  tons  entered  and  cleared 
out  of  American  ports  in  1790,  but  in  1800,  only 
40,000  tons.  From  1790  to  1792  the  American  tonnage 
that  entered  and  cleared  averaged  54,000  tons  a  year; 
in  1800  the  tonnage  that  entered  and  cleared  was 
236,000. 

Even  when  the  stupidity  of  the  administration  added 
the  embargo  to  all  other  ills  afflicting  our  shipping,  its 
vigor  was  not  destroyed.  The  registered  tonnage  fell 
from  840,163  in  1807  to  765,252  in  1808  under  the  em- 
bargo, but  after  the  embargo  was  removed  (March  i, 
1809),  the  figures  grew  within  the  year  to  906,855,  and  in 
1810  we  had  981,019  tons  registered  for  foreign  trade. 
Moreover,  127,000  tons  of  new  ships  were  built  during  that 


THE   BRITISH   AGGRESSIONS  147 

year,  and  in  that  year,  too,  our  ships  carried  91.5  per  cent 
of  all  American  imports  and  exports. 

The  reasons  for  this  prosperity  are  readily  found. 
American  enterprise  was,  in  those  days,  irrepressible. 
When  Salem  merchants  heard  that  dried  sea  slugs  (beche 
de  mer)  were  highly  prized  as  food  in  China,  and  that 
the  waters  of  the  Fiji  Islands  swarmed  with  the  worms, 
they  despatched  the  bark  Active  (July  26,  181 1),  under 
Captain  William  P.  Richardson,  to  collect  and  dry  enough 
of  the  slugs  to  freight  the  ship  for  the  Canton  market.  A 
more  remarkable  illustration  of  the  enterprise  of  the  day 
is  found,  perhaps,  in  the  fact  that  when  a  colony  of  New 
Englanders  settled  at  Marietta,  Ohio  (Captain  Abraham 
Whipple  was  of  the  number),  they  began  to  build  ships 
there  for  the  deep-water  trade.  The  brig  St.  Clair,  of  no 
tons,  was  launched  in  1800.  In  1801  a  ship  of  230  tons 
and  a  brig  of  126  were  built.  Three  ships  of  300  or  more 
tons  were  completed  in  1806  besides  a  number  of  smaller 
ones.  A  similar  record  was  made  the  next  year.  The 
largest  ship  built  there  was  the  Francis,  of  350  tons,  built 
by  Whitney  for  B.  J.  Oilman.  She  was  of  the  largest 
size  of  her  day.  In  all,  seven  ships,  eleven  brigs,  six 
schooners,  and  two  gunboats  (for  the  navy),  were  built  at 
Marietta  before  the  War  of  181 2.  Imagine  a  full-rigged 
ship,  with  all  sails  set,  plunging  down  over  the  Falls  of 
the  Ohio ! 

To  enterprise  was  added  unequalled  opportunity.  The 
wars   of  Europe  drove  the  ships   of   European   nations 


148    THE  STORY  OF   THE   MERCHANT  MARINE 

from  the  sea,  save  only  as  voyages  were  made  under 
convoy.  The  Americans  took  the  risks  because  the 
pay  v^^as  adequate.  Captain  George  Coggeshall,  in 
American  Privateers  (p.  200),  says  he  received  $45  per 
ton  freight  from  Bordeaux  to  Boston.  In  the  voyage 
of  Captain  Elias  Hasket  Derby,  described  in  the  last 
chapter,  his  cargo  carried  to  Gibraltar  cost  him  $43, 
275.     The    net    profit    made    upon    it    was    more    than 

$IOO,OCK). 

How  the  perils  of  trade  affected  the  quality  of  American 
ships,  especially  their  speed,  must  have  mention.  Hun- 
dreds of  our  vessels  were  captured  by  the  enemy,  but  many 
more  were  chased  in  vain.  It  was  at  this  time  that  the 
Baltimore  clippers  gained  world-wide  fame.  The  narrow 
and  shoal  waters  of  the  Chesapeake  had  compelled  Balti- 
more designers  to  make  shallow  models  that  could  beat 
to  windward  swiftly  in  all  winds.  The  peculiarity  of 
these  vessels  was  the  great  breadth  of  beam  and  a  conse- 
quent ability  to  carry  large  areas  of  sail.  No  models 
equalled  those  of  Baltimore,  and  when  speed  was  the  price 
of  safety  at  sea,  the  Baltimore  model  was  copied  every- 
where in  America. 

When  our  tonnage  in  the  foreign  trade  almost  reached 
the  million  mark  in  1810,  the  most  efficient  ships  in  the 
world  were  those  under  the  American  flag.  And  the 
character  of  our  merchant  seamen  is  shown  by  the  fact 
that  when  the  British  confiscated  one  of  our  ships,  they 
were  obliged  to  cut  down  her  spars  before  they  could 


^SSHBZi_ 


U    w 


\ 


'^i 


THE   BRITISH   AGGRESSIONS  149 

handle  her.  And  yet  some  of  our  nautical  writers  would 
have  us  believe  that  American  ships  increased  in  number 
in  those  days  because,  they  say,  a  discriminating  duty 
laid  on  imports  brought  to  the  country  in  foreign 
ships  afforded  "protection"  to  ships  under  the  American 
flag! 


CHAPTER  IX 

THE   BEGINNINGS   OF   STEAM   NAVIGATION 

IT  will  help  us  to  appreciate  the  work  of  the  men 
who  first  experimented  with  steam-driven  ships  if  we 
recall  the  fact  that  James  Watt,  working  at  Soho, 
near  Birmingham,  England,  invented  the  engine  which 
used  steam  on  both  sides  of  the  piston  in  1782,  and  that 
it  was  for  many  years  after  that  date  an  enormously  heavy 
and  cumbersone  machine.  From  this  fact  we  see  the 
state  of  the  mechanic  arts  in  England  at  the  end  of  the 
eighteenth  century,  when  practical  experiments  in  steam 
navigation  were  first  begun.  That  the  state  of  those  arts 
was  still  lower  in  the  United  States  would  be  naturally 
inferred  from  the  story  of  Bond's  efforts  to  restrain  progress 
by  reexporting  the  machinery  that  had  been  imported  at 
Philadelphia.  As  a  matter  of  fact,  when  one  American 
inventor  began  to  make  experiments  in  steam  navigation, 
he  was  obliged  first  of  all  to  train  men  in  the  work  of 
building  engines ;  he  was  unable  to  find,  anywhere  in  the 
country,  men  with  the  necessary  skill. 

One  of  the  most  curious  of  the  early  experiments  was 
that  made  by  James  Rumsey,  who  was  a  bath  tender  at 

150 


THE   BEGINNINGS   OF   STEAM   NAVIGATION     151 

a  pleasure  resort  in  Virginia.  He  first  planned  to  mount 
an  old-style,  single-acting  engine  in  a  boat,  connect  it 
with  a  pump,  draw  in  water  through  a  pipe  at  the  bow, 
and  then  force  it  out  astern.  When  this  plan  was  explained 
to  Washington,  he  wrote  a  testimonial,  saying,  "  the  dis- 
covery is  of  great  importance."  A  boat  built  on  this  plan 
was  eventually  driven  at  a  speed  of  four  miles  an  hour. 
Rumsey  also  experimented  with  a  screw  propeller,  but 
he  was  poor,  and  could  not  carry  the  experiment  to  a 
conclusion.  Finally  he  went  to  England  to  get  capital 
(a  fact  to  be  remembered),  and  there  he  died  before  he 
could  accomplish  anything  of  real  moment. 

Another  interesting  experimenter  was  John  Fitch,  of 
Pennsylvania,  a  man  who  was  handy  in  the  use  of  tools, 
and  who  was  also  a  surveyor  and  map-maker.  On 
December  2,  1785,  he  presented  to  the  American  Philo- 
sophical Society  of  Philadelphia  a  model,  with  draw- 
ings, of  a  steamboat.  The  New  Jersey  legislature  then 
gave  him  the  exclusive  right  to  navigate  the  waters  of  the 
State  with  steamboats,  and  a  company  was  organized  to 
develop  the  invention.  The  first  engine  built  had  a  3-inch 
cylinder.  It  was  mounted  in  a  skiff  and  was  connected 
at  one  time  with  a  screw  propeller,  at  another  with  an 
endless  chain  dragging  alongside,  and  with  a  "screw  and 
paddles,"  but  neither  device  would  drive  the  boat  at  a 
practical  speed.  Then  Fitch  conceived  the  idea  of  driv- 
ing with  paddles  somewhat  after  the  fashion  of  canoe 
men.     This  plan  worked  so  well  that  a  boat  forty  feet  long 


152    THE   STORY   OF   THE   MERCHANT   MARINE 

was  built  and  furnished  with  an  engine  having  a  12- 
inch  cyh'ndcr.  In  spite  of  the  fact  that  the  cylinder  of  this 
engine  had  wooden  ends  that  leaked,  and  a  piston  that 
did  not  fit  the  bore,  the  boat  was  driven  at  a  speed  of  four 
knots  an  hour. 

In  1788  Fitch  built  a  boat  sixty  feet  long  with  a  larger 
engine,  and  in  October  she  carried  thirty  passengers  to 
Burlington,  New  Jersey,  a  distance  of  twenty  miles,  in 
three  hours  and  ten  minutes.  The  speed  of  this  boat  being 
unsatisfactory,  still  another  was  built,  and  in  May,  1790, 
she  covered  a  measured  mile  in  seven  and  a  half  minutes, 
or  at  the  rate  of  eight  miles  an  hour.  She  was  then  put 
on  the  river  as  a  packet  plying  between  Philadelphia  and 
Trenton,  and  made  more  than  thirty  trips  of  which  records 
remain.     She  was  operated  by  paddles  at  the  stern. 

Though  Fitch's  plan  was  not  the  best  conceivable,  it 
is  now  admitted  that  his  boat  was  a  mechanical  success. 
He  built  a  workable  boat,  but,  unhappily,  he  was  far  ahead 
of  his  day  in  his  hopes  and  work.  The  people  were  not 
yet  ready  for  steam  navigation,  and  the  company  failed 
to  pay  dividends.  Meantime  another  boat  that  he  had 
built  to  run  on  the  Mississippi  was  wrecked,  and  that  loss 
ended  the  enterprise.  Fitch  finally  went  to  the  banks  of 
the  Ohio,  where  he  continued  his  eflforts  without  success. 

"The  day  will  come,"  he  wrote,  "when  some  more 
powerful  man  will  get  fame  and  fortune  from  my  invention, 
but  nobody  will  believe  that  poor  John  Fitch  can  do  any- 
thing worthy  of  attention."     Then  he  killed  himself. 


THE   BEGINNINGS   OF   STEAM   NAVIGATION     153 

In  1786,  Oliver  Evans,  a  Philadelphia  millwright,  asked 
the  legislature  of  the  State  to  give  him  the  exclusive  right 
to  build  steam  gristmills  and  road-wagons,  —  automobiles, 
in  other  words, — but  his  plans  were  not  treated  seriously. 
In  1801,  however,  he  built  a  steam  plaster  mill,  and  in 
1804  he  demonstrated,  in  a  way  that  yet  astonishes  the 
reader,  the  entire  feasibility  of  steam  navigation. 

Having  obtained  a  contract  for  dredging  some  of  the 
slips  along  the  Philadelphia  water  front,  he  built  a  scow, 
30x12  feet  large,  to  carry  the  dredge.  The  scow  was 
put  together  at  his  shop,  which  was  located  a  mile  from 
the  Schuylkill.  When  done,  he  mounted  a  steam  engine, 
(5x19  inches  large),  on  its  deck,  placed  temporary  wooden 
axles  with  temporary  wooden  wheels  underneath,  con- 
nected the  axles  and  engine  shaft,  and  then  steamed  away 
to  the  river.  There  he  removed  the  wheels  and  put  a  pad- 
dle wheel  at  the  stem  for  use  afloat.  Then  he  launched 
his  scow,  steamed  down  the  Schuylkill  and  up  to  the 
slips  he  was  to  dredge.  The  engine  was  thereafter  used 
in  the  work  of  dredging.  Although  that  was  in  1804,  the 
people  were  not  yet  ready  for  steam  navigation.  The  only 
practical  result  of  the  work  of  Evans  was  the  adoption  of 
the  high-pressure  engine,  so  called.  His  engine  had  no 
condenser.  It  exhausted  its  steam  into  the  open  air,  and 
this  style  of  engine  was  found  to  be  best  adapted  for  use 
on  the  steamboats  of  the  Western  rivers,  later  on. 

In  the  meantime  Robert  Fulton,  who  was  to  succeed,  had 
been  at  work.     Fulton  was  a  Pennsylvania  artist  who  had 


154    THE   STORY   OF   THE   MERCHANT   MARINE 

shown  so  much  talent  that  he  went  to  England  to  study 
under  Benjamin  West.  In  the  meantime,  however,  he  had 
been  greatly  interested  in  mechanics,  and  had  dreamed 
of  steamboats.  In  London  his  thoughts  turned  more  and 
more  to  mechanics,  and  in  1793  he  abandoned  art  to  take 
up  his  life-work. 

In  the  popular  view  the  most  interesting  chapter  in  Ful- 
ton's life  is  that  relating  the  story  of  the  first  voyage  of  his 
first  steamship;  but  for  the  encouragement  of  struggling 
inventors  the  most  important  facts  in  his  life  are  those 
showing  how  he  went  about  his  task.  For  Fulton  made 
a  thorough  study  of  his  subject;  while  experimenting  for 
himself  he  took  care  to  learn  as  much  as  possible  about 
what  others  had  already  done  in  the  same  line.  In  modem 
days,  when  every  important  invention  is  known  to  be  a 
development  from  crude  ideas  and  appliances  into  a  per- 
fect design,  it  seems  not  a  little  curious  to  read  that  in 
Fulton's  time  his  method  of  work  —  his  determination 
to  learn  his  subject  thoroughly  before  building  —  was 
considered  not  quite  creditable.  Invention,  it  was  thought, 
consisted  in  working  out  an  inspiration  in  the  dark ! 

Fulton's  first  effort  to  build  a  steamship  was  made  in 
1794,  when  he  went  to  Paris  and  tried  to  induce  the 
National  Convention  to  take  up  the  invention,  and  thus 
"deliver  France  and  the  whole  world  from  British  oppres- 
sion." Of  course  the  chaotic  conditions  in  Paris  pre- 
vented the  realization  of  his  hopes. 

Returning  to  England,  Fulton  published  a  pamphlet 


THE    BEGINNINGS   OF   STEAM   NAVIGATION     155 

on  steam  navigation  (1796),  but  failed  to  interest  the 
people.  Then  he  became  interested  in  marine  torpedoes 
and  submarine  navigation.  With  these  ideas  he  went 
again  to  Paris  (1802),  where  he  made  experiments  in 
working  a  boat  under  water,  but  failed  to  convince  Na- 
poleon, who  was  then  the  despotic  ruler  of  France.  While 
thus  engaged,  however,  he  met  Robert  R.  Livingston,  the 
American  minister  to  France.  In  connection  with  John 
Stevens  and  Nicholas  J.  Roosevelt,  of  New  Jersey,  Living- 
ston had  already  made  experiments  looking  toward  steam 
navigation  on  the  Hudson,  and  in  aid  of  his  enterprise 
had  secured  from  the  legislature  of  New  York  the  ex- 
clusive privilege  of  navigating  New  York  waters  with 
steamboats.  This  privilege  had  expired  by  limitation, 
and  the  experiments  had  come  to  an  end,  so  far  as  he  was 
concerned,  but  on  meeting  the  enthusiastic  Fulton  he  at 
once  became  interested  again,  and  furnished  money  for 
further  experiments.  Thereupon  Fulton  built  a  steam- 
boat that,  when  launched  upon  the  Seine,  in  1803,  in- 
stantly broke  in  two  and  sank.  The  frames  were  not 
strong  enough.  Fishing  up  the  engine,  Fulton  built  a 
stronger  hull,  and  this  time  the  engine  worked,  though  the 
speed  was  so  slow  that  only  Fulton  and  Livingston  be- 
lieved the  experiment  to  be  a  success. 

With  the  optimism  that  breeds  success,  Fulton,  backed 
by  Livingston,  now  made  drawings  of  an  engine  to  be  used 
in  a  boat  which  he  purposed  building  upon  the  Hudson, 
and  these  plans  he  carried  to  England,  where  he  ordered 


156     THE   STORY   OF   THE   MERCHANT   MARINE 

his  engine  of  Watt,  who  was  building  the  most  efficient 
engines  in  use. 

In  the  meantime,  William  Symington,  a  Scotch  engine 
builder,  had  been  experimenting  with  steamboats.  In 
1789  he  had  installed  an  engine  upon  a  double-hulled  yacht, 
with  which  one  Patrick  Millar  navigated  Lake  Dalwin- 
ston,  in  Scotland.  Although  Millar  spent  $150,000  in 
experiments  with  steam,  nothing  came  of  them.  In  1801 
Symington  induced  Lord  Dundas,  president  of  the  Forth 
&  Clyde  Canal  Company,  to  build  a  steam-tug  for  towing 
barges. 

This  tug,  named  the  Charlotte  Dundas,  had  an  engine 
with  a  22-inch  cylinder  (stroke  four  feet),  and  the  piston 
was  connected  directly  with  the  shaft  of  a  stern  paddle- 
wheel  by  means  of  a  piston  rod  and  a  connecting  rod  — 
a  plan  of  such  simplicity  that  it  came  into  universal  use 
later  on.  The  rudder  of  the  boat  was  handled  by  means 
of  a  wheel  placed  near  the  bow,  and  this  plan,  too,  received 
universal  approval.  In  March,  1802,  this  tug  towed  two 
70-ton  barges  nineteen  miles  and  a  half,  against  a  strong 
wind,  in  six  hours.  As  a  demonstration  of  the  feasibility 
of  steam  navigation  on  smooth  water,  that  passage  should 
have  been  entirely  convincing,  but  the  fear  that  the  wash 
from  the  wheel,  or  wheels  (for  Symington  thought  to  try 
side-wheels),  would  injure  the  banks  of  the  canal,  pre- 
vented the  adoption  of  the  tug. 

Fulton  had  learned  about  the  experiments  with  this  tug, 
and  while  in  England  contracting  for  the  engine  mentioned. 


THE   BEGINNINGS   OF   STEAM   NAVIGATION     157 

he  went  to  Scotland  and  visited  Symington,  who  fired  up 
the  boat  and  showed  Fulton  how  it  worked. 

In  December,  1806,  Fulton  came  to  New  York,  where 
he  contracted  with  Charles  Brown,  who  had  a  shipyard 
on  East  River,  between  Stanton  and  Third  streets,  for 
the  hull  of  a  new  boat.  The  model  of  this  hull  is  memo- 
rable. In  planning  ships  in  those  days  it  was  customary 
to  make  them  approximately  three  and  a  half  times  as  long 
as  they  were  broad,  and  at  least  half  as  deep  as  they 
were  broad.  But  Fulton's  plans  called  for  a  keelless 
hull  140  feet  long  over  all,  by  13  feet  wide,  and  only  7  feet 
deep.  One  feels  a  certain  sympathy,  even  now,  for  the 
sailors  of  that  day  who,  on  learning  the  facts  about  this 
ship,  named  it  FuUon^s  Folly. 

The  boiler  for  supplying  the  engine  with  steam  was  20 
feet  long,  8  wide,  and  7  feet  deep.  It  was  set  in  masonry. 
The  fuel  used  was  dry  pine.  The  engine  had  a  cylinder 
24  inches  in  diameter  with  a  4-foot  stroke.  It  was  not 
a  typical  Watt  engine,  however,  for  Watt's  piston  rods 
were  kept  in  line  by  a  combination  of  levers  and  rods  known 
as  a  "  parallel  motion, "  while  Fulton  had  called  for  a  cross- 
head  on  the  end  of  the  piston  rod,  and  the  cross-head  worked 
in  guides  in  an  A-frame.  From  each  end  of  the  cross- 
head  hung  a  connecting  rod.  These  connecting  rods 
were  joined  to  a  "bell-crank,"  which  was  not  unlike  a 
"walking  beam"  in  the  modern  river-boat,  but  it  was 
located  down  in  the  hull.  Connecting  rods  led  from  the 
bell-crank  to  cog-wheels  on  the  inner  ends  of  the  two  main 


158    THE   STORY   OF   THE   MERCHANT   MARINE 

shafts.  The  cog-wheels  served  as  cranks  which  turned 
with  the  vibrations  of  the  bell-crank.  The  paddle-wheels 
were  on  the  outboard  ends  of  the  main  shafts,  of  course. 
Then  cog-wheels  on  the  inner  ends  of  these  shafts  geared 
into  pinions  on  a  smaller  shaft  which  carried  two  fly-wheels, 
placed  outside  the  hull,  which  were  provided  to  carry 
the  engine  over  the  "dead  centre"  at  each  end  of  the 
stroke.  The  paddle-wheels  were  14  feet  in  diameter. 
The  main  shafts  were  each  of  cast  iron,  and  4^  inches 
in  diameter.  The  A-frame  and  guides,  the  cross-head, 
the  bell-crank  and  connecting  rods  to  the  cross-head,  and 
crank  cog-wheels,  the  crank-wheels,  paddle-wheels,  and 
shafts,  and  the  fly-wheels  and  their  driving  gear  were  all 
of  Fulton's  design. 

According  to  Fulton's  diary,  he  paid  Watt  ;;^548  for  the 
engine.  The  boiler,  built  by  Cave  &  Son,  of  London, 
cost  "at  25  2d  the  pound,  ;^476  ii5  2t/."  This  was  the  first 
engine  of  the  kind  that  Watt  was  allowed  to  build  for 
export,  and  Fulton  writes  on  March  22,  1805 :  — 

"  Fee  at  the  treasury  on  receiving  permission  to  ship  the 
engine  to  America,  £2  145  6^." 

Fulton  had  no  little  trouble  in  raising  the  money  for 
his  boat.  Livingston  contributed  the  larger  share,  while 
Joel  Barlow  and  David  Dunham  gave  the  next  larger 
shares.  The  remainder  of  the  sum  was  collected  among 
personal  friends  by  personal  solicitation,  and  that  was 
work  that  tried  the  soul  of  the  man.  The  fact  that  the 
engine  lay  on  the  pier  where  it  was  landed  for  a  period  of 


THE   BEGINNINGS   OF   STEAM   NAVIGATION     159 

six  months  because  Fulton  could  not  raise  the  money  to 
pay  the  freight  is  significant. 

The  new  ship  was  named  Clermont,  the  name  of  Living- 
ston's home  on  the  Hudson.     At  noon  on  Monday,  August 
17,  1807,  she  was  lying  near  the  old  State  prison  which 
stood  on  land  now  bounded  by  Washington,  West  Tenth, 
West  and  Charles  streets,  and  thousands  of  people  gathered 
to  gaze  at  the  remarkable  vessel  because  it  had  been  an- 
nounced that  she  was  to  make  a  trial  trip  some  time  during 
the  day.     They  observed  that  Brown,  the  builder,  was 
working  at  some  sails  stretched  to  a  mast  standing  at  each 
end  of  the  hull,  although  the  sails  were  not  set.     A  man 
named  Maxwell   (he  had  been  brought    from  the  shop 
of  the  London  makers)  was  tinkering  around  the  boiler  — 
stopping  leaks  with  melted  lead,  very  likely,  as  he  did, 
at  any  rate,  later.     Another  man.  Van  Lea,  was  adjusting 
what  is  called  a  harpoon  gun  in  the  records.     Harpoon 
guns,  as  the  American  whalers  know  them,  were  not  yet 
invented,  but  swivels  had  previously  been  used  for  throw- 
ing harpoons,  and  this  was,  perhaps,  such  a  gun.     What 
it  was  to  be  used  for  is  not  recorded.     The  spectators  were 
naturally  cynical,  and  the  humorists  of  the  class  that  in 
modern  days  write  the  jokes  for  newspapers,  shouted  to 
Fulton:    "God  help  you,  Bobby!"     "Bring  us  back  a 
chip  of  the  north  pole  !"     "  A  fool  and  his  money  are  soon 
parted!"     The  small  boys  whistled,  and  also  yowled  like 
cats.     Fulton's  correspondence  shows   that  his  sensitive 
soul  was  cut  to  the  quick. 


l6o    THE   STORY   OF   THE   MERCHANT   MARINE 

At  I  o'clock,  as  the  start  was  described  by  the  Evening 
Post,  everything  seemed  ready,  and  Fulton  told  Captain 
Moses  Rogers  *  to  cast  off  the  lines.  The  order  was  given 
to  the  engineer,  Stevens  Rogers,  a  relative  of  the  captain, 
to  start  the  machinery.  A  long  blast  was  blown  on  a  big 
tin  horn  as  a  warning  to  near-by  boats,  and  then  there 
was  a  "strange  creaking,  whirring,  churning  sound,  a  hiss 
of  the  escaping  steam;  the  awkward-looking  wheels, 
towering  full  seven  feet  above  the  deck  on  either  side, 
began  to  turn,  and  we  were  really  started  on  the  first 
steamboat  voyage  on  the  Hudson."  The  next  moment, 
however,  the  spectators  saw  the  machine  come  to  a  sudden 
stop,  and,  supposing  it  had  failed,  they  gave  a  derisive 
shout.  The  captain  of  a  passing  river-sailing  packet 
sheered  his  boat  close  in  to  the  pier  line,  and  "made  a 
sarcastic  offer"  to  "throw  us  a  line  and  tow  us  to  Albany." 

Perhaps  the  jeering  at  this  time  did  not  hurt  Fulton  so 
much  as  that  previously  mentioned,  for  he  had  ordered 
the  engine  stopped  in  order  to  readjust  the  boards  or  floats 
on  the  paddle-wheels.  He  had  noted  that  they  dipped 
too  far  into  the  water.  An  hour  or  more  passed  while 
the  crew  did  this  work.  When  it  was  done  and  the  throttle 
was  again  opened,  there  was  less  strain  on  the  machinery, 
and  the  Clermont  moved  smoothly  away  from  the  landing. 

'  See  James  Rogers  and  His  Descendants,  by  James  Swift  Rogers, 
Boston,  1902.  There  is  also  other  evidence  that  it  was  Captain  Moses 
Rogers,  but  the  New  York  papers  of  the  period  do  not  give  the  first  name 
of  the  captain  in  what  they  say  about  this  first  passage.  Captain  Rogers 
left  the  Clermont  on  reaching  Albany. 


THE   BEGINNINGS   OF   STEAM   NAVIGATION     i6i 

"The  jeers  of  the  ignorant,  who  had  neither  sense  nor 
feeling  enough  to  suppress  their  contemptuous  ridicule 
and  rude  jokes,  were  silenced  for  a  moment  by  a  vulgar 
astonishment  which  deprived  them  of  the  power  of  utter- 
ance till  the  triumph  of  genius  extorted  from  the  incred- 
ulous multitude  which  crowded  the  shores  shouts  and 
acclamations  of  congratulation  and  applause."  (Colden's 
Life  of  Robert  Fulton.) 

Heading  across  to  the  west  side  of  the  river  to  escape 
the  main  current  of  the  tide,  the  Clermont  passed  the  sloop 
whose  captain  had  jeered  her  (the  passengers  on  the 
Clermont  yelled  ecstatically  at  him  when  they  saw  his  look 
of  wonder),  and  then  steamed  along  under  the  shadows 
of  the  Palisades.  Night  came  on  as  she  entered  the 
Tappan  Zee,  and  because  it  was  a  dark  night  the  crews 
of  a  number  of  river-sloops  saw  a  vision  that  they  re- 
membered vividly  the  remainder  of  their  lives.  For  while 
they  gazed  down  the  river,  knowing  nothing  of  an  ex- 
periment in  steam  navigation,  they  saw  far  away  through 
the  darkness  the  flame  and  sparks  that  poured  from  the 
smokestack  of  the  Clermont  —  a  cloud  of  fire  moving 
along  between  heaven  and  earth  like  that  which  had 
guided  the  Children  of  Israel  in  the  desert.  Then,  as 
it  drew  near,  a  hoarse  growling  was  heard  and  a  fright- 
ful form  was  seen  coming  up  the  river  directly  against 
the  tide.  In  abject  terror  many  crews  jumped  into  small 
boats  and  fled  ashore.  Others  sought  shelter  in  the  holds 
of  their  boats  and  drew  the  hatches  tight,  while  others 


i62    THE  STORY   OF   THE   MERCHANT   MARINE 

still  fell  upon  their  knees  "and  besought  Providence  to 
protect  them  from  the  horrible  monster." 

In  the  meantime  the  guests  on  the  Clermont  (she  carried 
invited  guests  only  on  this  trip),  finding  the  river  air  some- 
v^rhat  chilly,  gathered  in  the  cabin,  where,  by  the  flickering 
light  of  a  "candle  in  its  high  protecting  glass,"  they  dis- 
cussed "the  popular  Salmagundi  papers,"  speculated 
"on  Mr.  Irving's  forthcoming  Knickerbocker's  History 
of  New  York,"  and  finally  "began  to  ply  Mr.  Fulton  vi^ith 
questions  about  the  steamboat  and  what  had  led  up  to  it." 
They  also  sang  "Ye  Banks  and  Braes  o'  Bonny  Doon," 
a  favorite  song  with  Fulton. 

Twice  on  the  way  up  the  river  the  Clermont  stopped  for 
fuel,  one  of  the  deck  hands  awakening  the  echoes  with  the 
big  tin  horn  on  each  occasion  to  let  the  wood-yard  men  know 
that  she  was  about  to  land.  Then,  just  twenty-four  hours 
after  leaving  New  York,  she  cast  anchor  before  the  home 
of  Livingston.  The  distance  she  had  covered  was  no 
miles.  She  remained  here  until  the  next  day,  and  it  is 
noted  in  the  histories  that  during  the  evening  Livingston 
and  a  party  of  friends  boarded  the  Clermont,  where, 
in  a  congratulatory  speech,  he  announced  the  engage- 
ment of  his  niece,  Miss  Harriet  Livingston,  to  Robert 
Fulton. 

Leaving  the  next  morning  at  9  o'clock,  the  Clermont 
reached  Albany  at  five  in  the  afternoon.  In  her  run  to 
that  city  the  Clermont  had  averaged  just  under  five  miles 
an  hour,  regardless  of  wind  and  tide. 


THE   BEGINNINGS   OF   STEAM   NAVIGATION     163 

While  neither  freight  nor  paying  passengers  had  been 
carried  on  the  trip  up,  the  boat  was  now  advertised  as  a 
packet.  Thereupon  a  number  of  men  came  on  board  for 
a  passage  to  New  York,  and  when  one  of  these  tendered 
the  money  for  the  trip,  tears  came  into  Fulton's  eyes.  For 
more  than  twenty  years  he  had  hoped  against  hope,  and 
now  he  saw  the  fruition  of  his  work. 

"Although  the  prospect  of  personal  emolument  has  been 
some  inducement  to  me,"  he  wrote  to  an  intimate  friend, 
"yet  I  feel  infinitely  more  pleasure  in  reflecting  on  the  im- 
mense advantages  my  country  will  derive  from  the  in- 
vention." 

On  her  return  to  New  York  the  Clermont  began  her 
career  as  an  Albany  packet,  with  regular  dates  for  leaving 
each  end  of  the  route.  She  was  advertised  in  the  Evening 
Post,  of  New  York,  on  September  2,  1807,  as  follows:  — 

"  The  North  River  steamboat  will  leave  Paulus  Hook 
Ferry  on  Friday  the  fourth  of  September,  at  six  in  the 
morning,  and  arrive  at  Albany  on  Saturday  at  six  in  the 
afternoon. 

"  Provisions,  good  berths,  and  accommodations  are  pro- 
vided. 

"  The  charge  to  each  passenger  is  as  follows :  — 

Time 

To  Newburgh $3  14  hours 

To  Poughkeepsie 4  17" 

To  Esopus 4J  20     " 

To  Hudson 5  3°     " 

To  Albany 7  36     " 


l64    THE  STORY   OF   THE   MERCHANT  MARINE 

"  For  places,  apply  to  Wm.  Vandervoort,  No.  48  Cort- 
landt  Street,  on  the  corner  of  Greenwich  Street. 

"  Way  passengers  to  Tarry  Town,  etc.,  will  apply  to  the 
captain  on  board. 

"  The  steamboat  will  leave  Albany  on  Monday  the 
seventh  of  September  at  six  in  the  morning,  and  arrive 
at  New  York  on  Tuesday  at  six  in  the  evening." 

Meals  were  served  without  extra  charge,  and  baggage 
weighing  sixty  pounds  was  carried  free  with  each  adult 
passenger.  The  freight  rate  to  Albany  was  three  cents 
a  pound.  The  Clermont  left  New  York  on  her  first  trip 
as  packet  at  6  o'clock  in  the  morning  on  September  4,  1807? 
carrying  twelve  through  and  three  way  passengers.  It 
was  noted  in  the  papers  of  the  period  that  people  were 
very  much  incensed  because  the  steamer  left  her  pier 
promptly  at  the  hour  advertised.  They  had  been  ac- 
customed to  having  the  river-sloops  wait  for  them. 

Morrison  points  out,  in  his  American  Steam  Naviga- 
tion, that  no  single  detail  of  the  Clermont  was  invented  by 
Fulton.  As  the  North  American  Review  of  July,  1838, 
says,  the  "  great  and  surpassing  merit  of  Fulton  con- 
sisted not  so  much  in  absolute  originality  as  in  the  skill 
with  which  he  availed  himself  of  all  the  theoretic  knowl- 
edge of  the  day,  and  applied  it  to  practical  purposes." 
His  choice  of  location  for  the  inauguration  of  steam  navi- 
gation is  to  be  noted,  for  New  York  and  the  Hudson 
afforded  an  amount  of  traffic  perhaps  more  valuable  than 
could  have  been  found  elsewhere  for  such  a  vessel.     More- 


THE  BEGINNINGS   OF   STEAM  NAVIGATION     165 

over,  he  was  fortunate  in  making  the  trial  at  a  time  when 
the  pubh'c  were  sufficiently  enlightened  to  appreciate  the 
value  of  steam. 

The  number  of  passengers  and  the  amount  of  freight 
carried  by  the  Clermont  in  the  fall  of  1807  led  Fulton  to 
rebuild  her  during  the  winter,  in  order  to  give  her  greater 
capacity.  Having  a  monopoly  of  the  waters  by  act  of  the 
legislature  (the  monopoly  was  contrary  to  the  Consti- 
tution of  the  United  States,  but  the  courts  did  not  decide 
the  matter  until  1824),  Fulton  had  no  trouble  in  raising 
capital,  and  with  the  growth  of  traffic  a  new  steamer,  the 
Car  of  Neptune,  was  placed  on  the  river  in  1808.  The 
Paragon  was  built  in  181 1,  and  in  1812  the  Fire  Fly  was 
built  for  way  traffic.  On  the  whole,  however,  the  evolu- 
tion of  steam  navigation  on  the  Hudson  was  slow,  at  least 
so  far  as  improvement  in  the  vessels  employed  was  con- 
cerned, until  the  monopoly  was  broken.  For  Fulton  died 
in  1815,  and  his  associates  were  not  progressive.  In  1825  an 
opposition  line  put  on  two  steamers  that  were  much  superior 
to  those  of  the  old  line,  and  in  1827  they  added  a  third. 
In  this  year  Robert  L.  Stevens,  a  son  of  John  Stevens,  put 
a  third  line  of  steamers  on  the  river,  and  in  1828  some  Albany 
capitalists  sought  a  share  of  the  traffic  with  a  steamer  called 
the  De  Witt  Clinton  that  made  a  record  of  more  than 
fourteen  miles  an  hour  between  Albany  and  New  York. 

In  1832  the  companies  on  the  river  consolidated,  and 
used  the  superfluous  boats  in  a  night  line  that  was  success- 
ful from  the  first. 


i66    THE   STORY   OF   THE   MERCHANT  MARINE 

Two  notable  improvements  were  made  in  the  engines  in 
the  meantime.  Robert  L.  Stevens  designed  a  light  wrought- 
iron  "walking  beam"  to  replace  the  heavy  cast-iron  beam 
that  was  previously  used.  Then  in  1824  James  P.  Allaire, 
who  had  made  a  reputation  as  an  engine  builder,  brought 
out  a  "compound"  engine.  A  compound  engine  has  two 
or  more  cylinders  of  different  diameters  coupled  to  the  one 
shaft.  In  the  Watt  engines  the  steam  was  conducted  from 
the  boiler  to  one  end  of  the  cylinder  and  allowed  to  flow 
in  until  the  piston  was  driven  almost  to  the  opposite  end. 
Then  it  was  shut  off  and  the  way  to  the  condenser  was 
opened.  Later  it  was  found  that  if  the  flow  of  steam  was 
cut  off  at  half  the  length  of  stroke  and  the  steam  already  in 
the  cylinder  was  allowed  to  work  by  expansion,  the  total 
power  of  the  engine  was  reduced  only  a  little,  while  the  sav- 
ing of  coal  was  very  great.  While  thinking  of  this  fact,  it 
occurred  to  Allaire  that  the  principle  involved  might  be 
used  to  better  advantage  if  the  steam  was  taken  at  full 
pressure  into  a  small  cylinder  and  exhausted  thence  into  a 
second  and  larger  one  to  work  by  its  expansive  power. 
The  Henry  Eckford,  the  Sun,  and  a  number  of  others  were 
supplied  with  engines  on  this  principle.  The  Eckford 
had  a  small  cylinder  12  inches  in  diameter  and  a  large  one 
of  24.  Both  had  the  same  stroke,  of  course.  But,  curi- 
ously enough,  it  was  not  until  about  1870  that  compound 
engines  became  the  fashion. 

The  racing  era,  as  one  may  call  it,  began  on  the  Hudson 
about  1835,  the  year  that  Daniel  Drew  became  interested 


THE   BEGINNINGS   OF   STEAM   NAVIGATION     167 

in  the  Hudson  River  steamers.  Racing  had  been  done 
before  the  consolidation  of  1832,  but  it  was  mild  in  compari- 
son with  that  under  Drew's  initiation.  An  unreasoning 
mania  for  speed  took  possession  of  the  public  as  well  as  of 
the  owners  of  steamers.  Though  no  practical  end  was  to 
be  served  by  the  saving  of  an  hour  in  the  time  required  in 
the  trip  from  New  York  to  Albany,  every  sacrifice  was  made 
and  every  risk  was  taken  to  secure  it.  Instead  of  going  to 
a  pier  or  dock  to  land  way-passengers  at  the  towns  along 
the  river,  the  unfortunates  were  dumped  into  a  small  skiff 
that  was  towed  at  the  end  of  a  long  rope.  Then,  as  the 
steamer  ran  in  close,  but  not  too  close,  to  the  landing,  the 
man  in  charge  of  the  skiff,  using  a  steering  oar,  sheered  it 
within  a  few  feet  of  the  landing,  and  the  passengers  were 
told  to  jump.  And  jump  they  did.  Of  course  a  few  fell 
into  the  water  at  every  trip;  perhaps  some  were  drowned 
thereby.  But  the  steamer's  reputation  for  making  quick 
passages  was  maintained,  and  for  a  long  time  the  public 
protested  in  vain.  When  legislation  was  invoked  (1842) 
the  act  was  opposed  as  an  unwarranted  attempt  to  inter- 
fere with  private  business  which  could  much  better  regulate 
itself ! 

It  is  an  interesting  fact  that  while  the  racing  on  the  Mis- 
sissippi resulted  in  the  explosion  of  many  boilers  and  the 
consequent  loss  of  hundreds  of  lives,  no  such  disasters  oc- 
curred on  the  Hudson.  The  Hudson  immunity  was  due 
to  a  difference  in  machinery.  On  the  Mississippi  "high- 
pressure  "  engines  were  used  —  there  was  no  condenser, 


l68    THE   STORY   OF   THE   MERCHANT   MARINE 

and  the  steam,  which  was  sometimes  carried  at  a  pressure 
of  150  pounds  to  the  square  inch,  was  exhausted,  after  use, 
into  the  open  air.  When  the  safety-valve  on  such  a 
boiler  was  tied  down  and  the  fire  was  urged  until  an  ex- 
plosion followed,  the  whole  boat  was  ripped  to  pieces.  On 
the  Hudson  condensers  were  used  because  the  water  was 
deeper  and  the  extra  weight  was  not  of  quite  so  much 
importance.  Moreover,  fuel  was  more  expensive,  and  the 
low-pressure  engine  was  more  economical.  Hudson  River 
boats  often  reached  the  end  of  the  run  with  boiler-plates 
bulging  and  ruined,  but  the  heartrending  disasters  of  the 
Mississippi  were  unknown  in  the  East. 

From  the  Hudson  the  use  of  steam  spread  first  to  the 
Delaware.  John  Stevens,  who  had  been  associated  with 
Livingston  and  Roosevelt  at  the  end  of  the  eighteenth  cen- 
tury, continued  his  experiments  after  Livingston  went  to 
France  as  American  minister.  He  could  not  find  any 
mechanics  fit  to  help  him  carry  out  his  ideas,  but  he  built  a 
machine  shop  and  trained  young  men  for  the  work.  In 
1804  he  made  a  number  of  trips  on  the  Hudson  with  a  25- 
foot  boat  that  was  propelled  by  screws.  He  also  invented 
the  tubular  boiler  "which  at  least  has  been  the  means  of 
working  wonders,  for  in  a  boiler  six  feet  long,  four  feet 
wide  and  two  feet  deep  he  exposed  four  hundred  feet  of 
surface,  in  the  most  advantageous  manner,  to  the  action  of 
fire."     (Macfarlane,  History  of  Propellers.) 

In  1807,  while  Fulton  was  bringing  out  the  Clermont, 
Stevens  had  a  smaller,  but  none  the  less  practical,  boat, 


THE   BEGINNINGS   OF   STEAM  NAVIGATION     169 

almost  ready.  He  missed  the  honor  of  leading  by  no  more 
than  two  weeks.  Being  unable  to  use  her  on  the  Hudson, 
Stevens,  in  June,  1808,  sent  her  to  the  Delaware,  under  the 
command  of  Captain  Moses  Rogers,  who  had  commanded 
the  Clermont  on  her  first  vogages,  and  his  son,  Robert  L., 
served  as  engineer.  Thus  this  vessel  —  she  was  named 
the  Phcenix  —  was  the  first  steamer  that  ever  went  to 
sea.  On  the  Delaware  the  Phcenix  proved  a  commercial 
success. 

The  next  step  in  the  expansion  of  steam  navigation  was 
taken  when  Nicholas  J.  Roosevelt  built  the  steamer  New 
Orleans  at  Pittsburg  (181 1),  and  demonstrated  to  the  in- 
credulous frontiersmen  of  the  region  —  especially  to  the 
"half  horse,  half  alligator"  keel  boatmen  —  that  a  steam- 
driven  boat  could  overcome  the  current  of  the  swiftest  part 
of  the  Mississippi. 

In  1 813  Fulton  and  his  associates  reached  out  for  along- 
shore trade  by  building  the  Fulton  for  use  between  New 
York  and  New  Haven,  but  because  of  the  activity  of  the 
British  war-ships  on  the  blockade,  she  did  not  make  her 
first  trip  until  March  21,  181 5,  when  she  carried  thirty 
passengers  to  New  Haven  in  eleven  hours. 

The  Massachusetts  was  the  first  steamer  in  use  at  Boston. 
She  began  plying  to  Salem  in  181 7.  In  the  same  year  the 
Fire  Fly  was  sent  from  New  York  to  Rhode  Island,  where 
she  was  used  between  Providence  and  Newport.  Round- 
ing Point  Judith  in  this  vessel  was  considered  a  feat 
showing  extraordinary  courage,  and  this,  too,  among  sailors 


lyo    THE   STORY   OF   THE   MERCHANT  MARINE 

who  thought  nothing  of  a  voyage  around  the  world  in  a 
ship  less  than  a  hundred  feet  long. 

In  1818  the  Walk-in-the-water  was  built  at  Black  Rock, 
(now  a  part  of  Buffalo),  on  the  Niagara  River,  for  use  on 
the  Great  Lakes.  When  ready  for  her  trial  trip,  she  was 
unable  to  stem  the  river  current  until  eight  yoke  of  oxen 
were  brought  to  her  assistance,  but  once  on  the  lake  she  did 
well.  She  made  her  first  trip  to  Detroit,  starting  on 
August  20,  1818,  and  covered  the  distance  in  about  forty 
hours,  using  a  cord  of  wood  an  hour. 

By  the  annual  report  of  the  Commissioner  of  Navigation 
it  appears  that  four  steamboats,  aggregation  457  tons,  were 
built  in  the  United  States  in  181 2,  the  first  year  for  which 
there  is  a  record.  In  18 13  seven  of  an  aggregate  tonnage 
of  1430  were  built,  and  in  1819  the  number  was  twenty- 
eight,  with  a  tonnage  of  7291.  More  than  a  hundred  had 
been  built  in  all.  This  expansion  was  almost  but  not 
quite  all  made  upon  inland  or  sheltered  waters.  Fulton 
had  looked  toward  the  high  seas.  He  had  built  a  steam- 
ship, which  he  named  the  Emperor  Alexander,  to  sell  to  the 
Russian  government,  but  the  War  of  181 2  prevented  his 
trying  to  navigate  her  across  the  ocean,  and  she  was  even- 
tually worn  out  at  home.  During  the  war  he  built  the  huge 
war  steamer  Demologos,  a  vessel  fit  to  go  along  the  coast, 
and  crude  as  she  was,  she  would  have  changed  the  manner 
of  war  at  sea  had  she  been  set  afloat  a  year  sooner. 

The  year  18 19  is  especially  memorable  because  a  trans- 
atlantic steam  passage  was  then  made.     It  appears  that 


THE   BEGINNING   OF   STEAM   NAVIGATION     171 

Captain  Moses  Rogers  was  the  originator  of  the  venture. 
In  1818  Francis  Fickett  built  a  common  sailing  ship  at 
New  York  that  was  100  feet  long  by  28  broad  and  14  deep. 
Rogers  had  had  the  honor  of  first  navigating  the  sea  with 
a  steamer,  and  he  had  been  selected  in  1816,  because  of  his 
reputation  for  courage  and  skill,  to  take  the  steamer  New 
Jersey  from  New  York  to  the  Chesapeake,  a  voyage  thought 
to  be  full  of  danger  for  such  a  vessel.  He  was  now  in- 
spired with  the  ambition  to  be  the  first  to  drive  a  steam- 
ship across  the  Atlantic,  and  after  a  look  at  the  ship  that 
Fickett  was  building,  he  persuaded  Scarborough  &  Isaacs, 
ship  merchants  of  Savannah,  to  buy  and  fit  her  with  a  steam 
engine  for  use  between  Savannah  and  Liverpool. 

The  engine  for  this  ship  was  built  by  Stephen  Vail,  of 
Speedwell,  New  Jersey,  and  the  boiler  by  David  Dod,  of 
Elizabethtown,  New  Jersey.  It  is  worth  while  to  inter- 
rupt the  narrative  to  consider  these  two  facts.  At  the 
beginning  of  the  century  mechanics  had  been  so  scarce 
in  the  nation  that  Stevens  had  to  train  men  for  his 
work.  But  in  1819  mechanics  and  shops  fitted  for  engine 
building  were  found  not  only  in  the  larger  cities  but  in 
some  of  the  smaller  towns  close  to  navigable  waters. 
That  these  shops  had  been  brought  into  existence  through 
the  mechanical  progress  —  perhaps  it  may  be  called  the 
mechanical  awakening  —  that  was  due  to  the  success  of 
steam  navigation  is  beyond  question.  Many  machine 
shops  had  been  built,  and  were  profitably  employed.  They 
not  only  built  engines,  but    other  tools  for  many  kinds 


172    THE   STORY   OF   THE   MERCHANT   MARINE 

of  work.  The  day  when  a  British  consul  like  Bond  could 
hamper  the  progress  of  American  manufactures  by  reex- 
porting  tools  made  in  England  was  passing. 

The  paddle-wheels  fitted  to  the  new  ship  for  use  on  the 
Atlantic  were  made  of  iron.  They  had  eight  radial  arms, 
each  so  arranged  (according  to  Preble)  that  they  could  be 
folded  up  like  a  fan  and  laid  inboard  when  the  ship  was 
under  sail;   for  her  sailing  rig  was  retained. 

Leaving  New  York  on  March  28,  1819,  under  Captain 
Rogers,  this  ship  (she  was  named  Savannah)  ran  to  her 
home  port  in  eight  days  and  fifteen  hours,  during  which 
she  used  steam  for  forty-one  and  a  half  hours.  On  May  24 
she  sailed  for  Liverpool,  and  made  the  passage  in  twenty- 
seven  days,  during  which  she  used  steam  for  eighty  hours. 
While  off  the  coast  of  Ireland  the  crew  of  a  revenue  cutter 
that  saw  her  supposed  she  was  on  fire,  and  made  haste  to 
go  to  her  assistance.  In  a  trip  from  Liverpool  to  St.  Peters- 
burg, Russia,  occupying,  with  stops  at  ports  on  the  way, 
thirty-three  days,  she  was  under  steam  ten  days.  She 
finally  arrived  back  at  Savannah  on  November  30,  and  then 
went  to  New  York,  where  her  machinery  was  removed  and 
sold. 

The  Savannah  was  what  would  now  be  called  an  auxil- 
iary steamer;  steam  was  used  when  the  wind  did  not  serve. 
She  failed  to  inaugurate  steam  traffic  across  the  Atlantic 
chiefly  because  of  the  space  occupied  by  fuel — wood. 

Although  Captain  R.  B.  Forbes,  one  of  the  ablest  seamen 
the  nation  ever  produced,  built  an  auxiliary  steamer  (the 


THE  BEGINNING   OF   STEAM  NAVIGATION     173 

Massachusetts)  in  1845,  that  made  profitable  voyages, 
and  there  were  features  of  the  system  that  make  it  seem 
very  attractive  for  certain  trades,  few  vessels  of  the  class 
have  ever  been  used. 

The  year  1819  is  also  memorable  because  of  an  effort  to 
establish  a  line  of  steamers  running  from  New  York  to 
New  Orleans,  with  stops  at  Charleston,  South  Carolina, 
and  Havana,  Cuba,  on  the  way.  The  line  was  maintained 
for  five  years,  and  then  withdrawn  because  it  could  not  be 
made  to  pay. 

In  1819,  too,  a  ship  was  put  on  the  route  between  Mobile 
and  New  Orleans,  but  this  was  also  a  failure. 

In  1822  the  steamer  New  York  began  to  ply  between 
New  York  and  Norfolk,  but  she  was  unable  to  compete 
with  the  sailing  packets.  The  steamer  Patent,  that  began 
making  regular  voyages  between  Boston  and  Maine  ports 
in  1823,  also  failed  to  pay  dividends. 

Not  to  add  details  of  this  kind,  it  may  be  said  that  while 
fortunes  were  made  in  steamboats  plying  on  inland  waters 
of  the  United  States,  almost  every  venture  made  with 
American  steamers  upon  the  ocean  during  the  thirty  years 
following  the  Clermont'' s  first  trip  on  the  Hudson  proved  un- 
profitable. In  connection  with  this  dismal  record  the  story 
of  the  steamer  Home,  built  for  the  trade  between  New  York 
and  Charleston,  South  Carolina,  is  instructive.  Keeping 
in  mind  the  fact  that  this  steamer  was  designed  to  round 
Cape  Hatteras,  where  the  worst  storms  on  the  coast  were 
known    to   rage,  consider    these   facts:   the    Home  was 


174    THE   STORY   OF   THE   MERCHANT  MARINE 

212  feet  long  by  22  wide  and  12  deep.  She  was  nearly 
18  times  as  long  as  she  was  deep,  and  she  was  built  of 
wood,  at  that.  The  engine,  which  was  placed  near  the 
centre,  as  usual,  had  a  cylinder  56  inches  in  diameter,  with 
a  stroke  of  9  feet,  and  that  is  to  say  it  was  enormously 
heavy  for  a  hull  of  such  proportions.  A  set  of  iron  braces 
was  provided  on  each  side  to  strengthen  the  hull,  but  on 
the  first  trip  they  "broke  loose  from  their  sockets  on  deck 
at  their  forward  ends,  by  the  elastic  movement  of  the  vessel 
in  a  heavy  sea,"  as  W.  C.  Redfield,  a  New  York  engineer, 
said  in  describing  the  vessel. 

Two  voyages  were  made  with  no  greater  visible  injury 
than  the  breaking,  on  each  voyage,  of  the  worthless  braces. 
On  November  9,  1837,  as  the  Home  was  bound  on  her 
third  voyage,  she  was  overtaken  by  a  northeast  gale,  and 
shortly  after  passing  the  Hatteras  shoals,  it  was  found 
that  the  "elastic  movement"  of  the  hull,  which,  according 
to  Engineer  Redfield,  was  "necessarily  and  properly  mani- 
fested," had  opened  an  uncontrollable  leak.  The  Home 
was  then  driven  on  the  beach,  where  she  at  once  went  to 
pieces.     About  a  hundred  lives  were  lost. 

It  is  important  to  note  here  that  Engineer  Redfield,  in 
writing  his  defence  of  the  Home  (1842),  was  entirely  sin- 
cere. Further  than  that,  the  owners  of  the  vessel  were  so 
confident  that  she  was  of  a  proper  model  in  all  respects  that 
the  only  insurance  they  carried  upon  her  was  for  a  small 
sum  to  secure  a  creditor. 

From  this  story,  and  others  of  the  kind  to  be  found  in 


THE   BEGINNING   OF   STEAM  NAVIGATION     175 

the  records,  it  appears  that,  while  American  designers  were 
then  building  sailing  ships  and  inland-water  steamers  that 
were  highly  profitable,  they  were  astonishingly  ignorant  of 
the  requirements  of  a  steamship  for  deep-sea  navigation. 

In  a  search  for  the  reasons  for  this  curious  condition 
of  affairs  it  is  found  that  the  success  of  the  inland-water 
steamers  was  the  primary  cause  of  the  American  failure 
at  sea.  The  men  who  designed  the  sea-going  steamers  had 
been  trained  in  their  art  by  designing,  first  of  all,  steamers 
for  inland  waters.  Because  these  inland-water  steamers 
succeeded  so  well,  it  was  entirely  natural  that  similar  pro- 
portions should  be  given  to  the  engines  that  were  to  be  used 
upon  deep  water.  It  was  also  natural  to  model  the  hulls 
as  nearly  as  possible  like  the  hulls  on  smooth  waters.  At 
the  same  time  it  was  believed,  incredible  as  the  state- 
ment may  seem  now,  that  an  "elastic"  hull  —  one  that 
bends  to  the  lift  of  the  waves  as  a  rope  does — was  not  only 
swifter  but  safer  than  a  stiff  one. 

A  paragraph  as  to  the  durability  of  the  inland-water 
steamers  will  now  prove  instructive.  In  the  report  of 
Israel  D.  Andrews  on  "Colonial  and  Lake  Trade"  (Sen. 
Ex.  Doc.  112,  32  Cong,  i  Sess.),  it  is  said  (p.  665)  that 
"the  period  of  the  natural  life  of  a  steamboat"  in  use  on 
the  inland  waters  of  the  United  States  at  that  time  (1851) 
was  only  "  three  and  a  half  to  four  years,"  This  statement 
included  the  steamers  in  use  on  the  Great  Lakes,  which 
had  much  longer  lives  than  those  on  the  rivers. 

With  all  these  facts  in  mind,  one  sees  why  the  deep-water 


176    THE   STORY   OF   THE   MERCHANT  MARINE 

American  steamers  failed.  Led  on  by  the  success  of  the 
river  steamers,  the  designers  turned  out  engines  of  the  light- 
est possible  weight  consistent  with  the  greatest  power,  and 
then  bolted  them  fast  to  the  frames  of  hulls  that  were 
"elastic" — would  yield  to  the  waves  like  a  rope.  Not 
many  of  these  steamers  went  to  pieces  as  the  Home  did; 
good  seamanship  saved  them  from  that  fate;  but  neither 
good  seamanship  nor  any  economy  practised  afloat  or 
ashore  could  make  them  pay  dividends  in  the  face  of  the 
enormous  expense  due  to  the  wear  and  tear  of  machinery. 
Machinery  built  for  speed  could  pay  dividends  on  the  in- 
land waters  because  the  steamers  had  no  competition  except 
that  which  they  created  among  themselves,  and  that  lasted 
for  short  periods  only.  The  only  competitors  on  the  river- 
banks  were  stage-coaches  and  big  wagons  that  were  driven 
over  the  worst  roads  in  the  civilized  world.  The  inland- 
water  steamers  charged  what  prices  they  pleased.  At  sea 
the  steamers  with  their  unfit  machinery  had  to  compete 
with  the  swiftest,  most  comfortable,  and  in  every  way  the 
most  economical  sailing  packets  in  the  world.  And  until 
the  designers  had  learned  the  requirements  of  a  sea-going 
steamship,  the  sailing  packets  won. 


CHAPTER  X 

PRIVATEERS,  PIRATES,  AND  SLAVERS   OF  THE  NINETEENTH 
CENTURY 

WHEN  seen  in  its  true  light,  one  of  the  most 
curious  and  interesting  chapters  in  the  history 
of  the  American  merchant  marine  is  that  re- 
lating to  the  men  who,  having  the  might,  used  it  to  take 
from  those  who  were  weaker  not  only  property  but  liberty 
and  hfe;  but  the  reader  who  supposes  that  superior  abil- 
ity, natural  or  acquired,  gives  him  the  right  to  take  more 
of  the  good  things  of  life  than  his  less-favored  neighbor 
receives,  will  scarcely  comprehend  the  facts. 

The  fighting  done  by  the  American  merchantmen  who 
were  commissioned  as  privateers  during  the  War  of  1812 
has  been  well  described  by  our  histories  of  the  navy,  but 
the  story  of  one  battle  is  worth  recalling  briefly  because  it 
may  well  stand  in  some  respects  for  the  story  of  the  entire 
fleet.  On  March  26,  181 5,  the  privateer  schooner  General 
Armstrong,  Captain  Samuel  Chester  Reid,  anchored  in 
Fayal  Roads,  in  the  Azores.  As  night  came  on,  a  British 
squadron,  bound  for  New  Orleans,  came  into  the  roads, 
and  on  seeing  the  Armstrong,  sent  four  boats  full  of  men 
to  capture  her.     A  well-directed  broadside  from  the  pri- 

N  177 


1 78    THE   STORY   OF   THE   MERCHANT  MARINE 

vateer  sent  them  in  haste  back  to  their  ships,  but  a  httle 
after  midnight  the  enemy  came  again  in  twelve  boats, 
carrying  more  than  400  men.  Each  boat  was  armed  with 
a  cannon.  The  Armstrong  had  90  men,  and  she  mounted 
a  long  24-pounder  on  a  pivot  with  four  9-pounders  in  each 
broadside. 

When  the  flotilla  came  within  point-blank  range,  Captain 
Reid  opened  a  fire  that  would  have  beaten  back  any  other 
civilized  enemy,  but  this  veteran  host  pulled  steadily  in 
until  the  boats  were  alongside  from  stem  to  stern,  and 
then  they  rose  up,  as  one  man,  and  strove  to  board  the 
low-lying  schooner.  But  with  sword  and  pike  and  battle- 
axe  the  privateersmen  fought  not  only  for  life  but  to  avenge 
the  wrongs  that  had  been  suffered  by  American  seamen 
at  the  hands  of  press-gangs,  and  even  British  valor  could 
not  face  them.  One  of  the  defeated  wrote  that  the 
"Americans  fought  more  like  blood-thirsty  savages  than 
anything  else."  We  may  believe  that  they  were  thrilled 
with  the  joy  of  battle,  and  if  a  modern,  peace-loving 
American  is  ever  permitted  to  envy  any  of  his  countrymen 
who  have  had  part  in  any  battle  described  in  the  histories 
of  the  nation,  the  men  of  the  General  Armstrong  will  come 
to  his  mind  first  of  all.  But  a  liner,  a  frigate,  and  a  brig 
were  at  hand  to  back  the  boats,  and  at  last  Reid  had  to 
burn  his  ship. 

The  gallant  fight  and  the  ultimate  loss  stand  for  much 
good  fighting  without  profit  in  the  work  of  our  private 
armed   ships  during  the   War  of   1812.     Our   histories, 


PRIVATEERS,   PIRATES,   AND   SLAVERS  179 

almost  without  exception,  have  overstated  the  success  of 
the  privateers  and  their  influence  upon  the  course  of  the 
war.  A  few  of  these  ships  —  a  very  few  —  made  enormous 
profits;  the  others  made  insignificant  gains  or  actual 
losses.  Our  histories  laud  the  work  of  the  few  that  really 
succeeded;  they  ignore  all  that  failed,  save  only  as  the 
reader  is  left  to  infer  that  all,  or  nearly  all,  did  well.  Thus 
the  fact  that  the  Rossie,  of  Baltimore,  Captain  Joshua 
Barney,  in  a  single  cruise,  captured  vessels  supposed  to  be 
worth  more  than  $1,500,000  is  told  in  every  history;  the 
equally  well- authenticated  fact  that  Barney's  share  of  the 
plunder  amounted  to  only  $1000  (see  Mary  Barney's 
Memoir),  because  the  much- vaunted  prizes  were  either 
destroyed  at  sea,  or  were  sold  for  little  or  nothing  in  port, 
—  this  fact  is  deliberately  omitted. 

In  the  matter  of  net  gains  the  Rossie  stands  as  a  type 
of  the  successful  privateers,  with  a  few  exceptions.  On 
November  23,  181 2,  less  than  six  months  after  war  was 
declared,  and  while  the  successful  privateers  were  securing 
the  best  of  their  prizes,  the  privateer  owners  of  Boston, 
New  York,  and  Norfolk  united  in  a  petition  to  Congress, 
begging  help  through  legislation  because  captured  goods 
sold  for  such  low  prices  that  no  profit  was  made  by  even 
the  successful  privateers.  The  captured  ships,  it  was  said, 
could  not  be  sold  at  any  price,  even  when  fit  for  use  as 
privateers.  In  short,  "the  profits  of  private  naval  warfare 
are  by  no  means  equivalent  to  the  hazard."  (Rep.  Com. 
Ways  and  Means,  December  12,  p.  3.) 


i8o    THE   STORY  OF  THE   MERCHANT  MARINE 

In  Guernsey's  New  York  City  During  the  War  of  1812 
is  a  list  of  the  privateers  sailing  from  that  city  —  120  in 
all.  Of  these,  57  took  not  one  prize.  It  is  to  be  presumed 
that  21  of  them  made  some  money,  because  they  took  at 
least  5  prizes,  while  7  took  at  least  15,  and  it  may  be  sup- 
posed that  they  did  well.  But  when  it  is  remembered  that 
in  those  days  a  ship  commonly  paid  for  herself  in  one 
voyage  in  ordinary  trade,  it  cannot  be  said  that  privateer- 
ing was  of  any  special  benefit  except  to  three  or  four 
that  took  many  prizes. 

The  total  number  of  merchant  ships  that  were  used  for 
privateers  during  this  war  was  515,  and  the  total  number 
of  prizes  was  1345.  The  British  admiralty  reported  the 
capture  of  1328  American  merchantmen,  of  which  228  were 
privateers.  The  unrecorded  disasters  to  privateers  through 
storms  certainly  brought  the  number  of  total  losses  of 
these  vessels  up  to  a  half  of  all  that  were  commissioned. 
It  is  notable,  too,  that  the  number  of  American  merchant- 
men captured  by  the  enemy  was  only  thirteen  less  than 
the  number  taken  from  the  enemy,  and  it  follows  that  the 
American  losses  were  greater,  in  this  respect,  than  those 
of  the  British ;  for  the  American  ships  were,  on  the  average, 
worth  much  more  than  the  British,  On  the  whole  it 
appears  that,  if  the  predatory  part  of  the  War  of  1812  had 
any  influence  upon  the  result,  the  Americans  were  the 
greater  losers. 

Then,  too,  the  losses  of  property  were  only  one  part 
of  the  injury  inflicted  upon  the  country  by  this  kind  of 


PRIVATEERS,   PIRATES,   AND   SLAVERS  i8i 

war.  A  consideration  of  the  effect  of  the  prevaih'ng  greed 
for  a  "  subject  of  safe  and  uncontested  capture  "  is  of  special 
interest  here  because  some  of  the  owners  of  our  privateers, 
influenced  solely  by  this  greed,  became  pirates  after  the 
war  ended.  The  Spanish  colonists  in  America  had  re- 
volted, beginning  in  1810.  The  insurgent  armies  were 
scattered  in  small  bands,  here  and  there,  in  the  vast  territory 
between  Texas  and  the  Rio  de  la  Plata,  and  the  leader 
of  every  band  was  a  law  unto  himself.  But  in  every 
revolted  province  some  aggregation  of  patriots  —  some 
junta  —  was  recognized  by  foreign  powers  as  enough  of 
a  government  to  be  entitled  to  belligerent  rights.  When 
the  War  of  181 2  came  to  an  end,  the  privateers  that  were 
loath  to  give  up  their  predatory  career  looked  away  to  the 
Spanish  main.  The  insurgent  leaders  were  competent 
to  commission  armed  cruisers  for  war  upon  Spanish  com- 
merce, and  rich  Spanish  ships  were  afloat. 

Some  of  the  w^ork  done  by  American  ships  sailing  under 
Spanish-American  commissions  is  memorable.  Two  that 
were  owned  in  Baltimore  brought  to  Norfolk,  in  March, 
181 7,  coin  and  cochineal  valued  at  $290,000,  and  there  is 
reason  to  suppose  that  Captain  James  Chaytor,  who  was 
senior  officer  of  the  two,  and  one  of  the  best  known  of  the 
men  so  engaged,  brought  to  port  property  worth  half  a 
million  of  dollars  in  the  course  of  that  year.  One  of 
Chaytor's  prizes  was  a  galleon  from  the  Philippines,  and 
it  was  taken  within  sight  of  Cadiz. 

Captain   Joseph   Almeda,   of  Baltimore,  was  another 


i82    THE   STORY   OF   THE   MERCHANT  MARINE 

noted  commander  of  this  class  of  cruisers.  In  a  vessel 
named  the  Congress  he  blockaded  the  port  of  Havana  for 
weeks  at  a  stretch,  and  took  prizes  almost  within  range  of 
the  Alorro. 

For  a  time  the  American  people  applauded  the  success  of 
these  cruisers,  because  it  was  supposed  that  they  were  aiding 
struggling  patriots  to  gain  liberty.  The  story  of  one  of  the 
cruisers,  as  told  in  court,  however,  in  time  changed  public 
opinion.  Captain  James  Barnes,  commanding  a  Balti- 
more cruiser  named  the  Puerrydon,  with  a  commission  from 
Buenos  Ayres,  captured  on  March  21,  18 18,  the  Spanish 
brig  Corrunes,  while  she  was  carrying  general  merchandise 
from  Tarragona,  Spain,  to  Vera  Cruz,  Mexico.  A  prize 
crew  of  seven  men  was  placed  upon  the  prize,  and  five 
of  her  Spanish  crew  were  left  on  board  to  help  work  ship. 
On  May  8  a  storm  separated  the  two  vessels,  whereupon 
the  foremast  hands  upon  the  prize  mutinied,  put  their 
officers  upon  a  passing  merchantman,  and  then  went  cruis- 
ing along  the  coast  of  the  United  States.  They  were  not 
bound  for  any  particular  port;  they  were  just  enjoying 
life  while  they  might.  Eventually  they  ran  ashore  on 
Block  Island,  and  when  the  inhabitants  came  to  the  beach 
to  look  at  the  stranded  brig,  the  mutineers  began  trading 
the  cargo  of  the  vessel  for  fresh  provisions,  and  later  for 
coin.  The  islanders  made  such  good  bargains  that  they 
sent  for  friends  in  Newport  to  come  over  and  share  in  the 
good  fortune,  but  that  was  an  error  of  judgment,  because 
the  revenue  officers  thereby  learned  about  the  trading,  and 


PRIVATEERS,   PIRATES,   AND   SLAVERS  183 

brig,  crew,  and  some  of  the  traders  were  haled  before  the 
United  States  court. 

The  trials  that  followed  were  among  the  most  remark- 
able ever  reported  in  the  annals  of  the  Supreme  Court, 
Although  held  in  jail  on  the  charge  of  piracy,  the  crew 
libelled  the  vessel  on  the  ground  that  they  had  rescued  her 
from  Barnes,  whom  they  denounced  as  a  pirate.  Captain 
Barnes  and  the  other  owners  sued  for  the  property  on  the 
ground  that  Barnes  had  captured  it  while  he  was  a  citizen 
of  Buenos  Ayres,  and  in  command  of  a  lawful  Buenos 
Ayres  cruiser.  A  Spanish  consul  sued  for  it  in  behalf 
of  the  original  owners.  In  the  court  of  last  resort  it  was 
held,  in  spite  of  much  perjury,  that  the  naturalization  of 
Barnes  in  Buenos  Ayres  was  "altogether  in  fraud  of  the 
laws  of  his  own  country,"  and  that  the  owners  of  the 
cruiser  were  asking  for  the  possession  of  a  vessel  that  they 
had  captured  "in  violation  of  the  most  solemn  stipulation 
of  a  treaty,  and  provision  of  a  law  of  their  own  country, 
and  of  which  they  had  been  dispossessed  by  their  own 
associates  in  guilt." 

"It  is  a  melancholy  truth,"  continued  the  court,  "too 
well  known  to  this  court,  that  the  instruments  used  in 
these  predatory  voyages,  carried  on  under  the  colors  of  the 
South  American  states,  are  among  the  most  abandoned 
and  profligate  of  men." 

Under  the  treaty  mentioned,  these  American-owned 
cruisers  were  pirates.  How  many  cruisers  of  the  kind 
were  fitted  out  from  American  ports  (there  were    some 


i84    THE   STORY   OF  THE   MERCHANT   MARINE 

European  ships  in  the  business  also)  cannot  be  learned 
now,  but  a  list  of  twenty-eight  is  printed  in  the  Annals 
of  the  Fifteenth  Congress,  The  list  is  incomplete.  Most 
of  them  were  owned  in  Baltimore,  and  in  1823  the  Columbia, 
South  Carolina,  Telescope  denounced  that  city  as  "the 
home  port  of  a  fleet  of  Spanish-American  pirates."  In 
reply  to  this,  Niks' s  Register,  dated  May  24,  1823,  said :  — 

"Perhaps  it  may  afford  the  editor  of  the  Telescope  some 
satisfaction  to  learn  that  every  person  who  was  fully  re- 
garded as  being  engaged  in  whatever  could  have  given  rise 
to  his  censure  for  piracy  has  become  a  bankrupt  as  well 
in  character  as  in  property." 

It  is  to  be  noted,  further,  that  these  cruisers  were  not 
pirates  merely  by  the  existence  of  a  treaty  with  Spain. 
They  captured  the  ships  of  all  nations  when  it  could  be 
done  safely,  and  sometimes  they  did  this  openly.  When 
Almeda  was  blockading  Havana,  he  seized  a  British  vessel 
at  the  mouth  of  the  harbor  because  she  happened  to  have 
some  Spanish  property  on  board.  But  the  most  deplorable 
cases  were  those  in  which  the  ships  were  seized  by  cruisers 
that  had  been  unlucky.  For  in  such  cases  the  prizes  were 
robbed  and  then  sunk  with  all  hands. 

Still  another  result  of  the  work  of  these  pirates  was  the 
establishment  of  two  remarkable  communities,  one  in 
Texas  and  the  other  in  Florida,  both  of  which  territories 
were  then  under  the  Spanish  crown.  Both  settlements 
were  made  to  provide  a  market  for  the  goods  which  these 
cruisers  captured ;  for  after  the  decision  of  the  courts  noted 


PRIVATEERS,   PIRATES,   AND   SLAVERS  185 

above,  the  prizes  could  be  no  longer  sent  to  the  United 
States. 

The  Texas  community  was  established  by  Jean  Lafitte, 
who  had  had  much  experience  as  a  smuggler  at  Barataria 
Bay,  Louisiana,  both  before  and  during  the  War  of  1812. 
He  had  also  made  several  cruises  on  pirate  ships  — 
enough  to  learn  that  more  money  could  be  made  buying 
prizes  from  the  cruisers  than  in  cruising. 

Lafitte  went  to  the  island  where  the  thriving  city  of 
Galveston  now  stands,  late  in  1816,  and  found  there 
a  number  of  shanties  which  had  been  built  by  one  Luis 
de  Aury,  a  pirate  who  had  intended  to  establish  such  a 
nautical  "fence"  as  Lafitte  had  in  mind.  But  Aury 
thought  the  distance  from  the  United  States  too  great,  and 
left  the  place  to  Lafitte,  who  at  once  sent  word  to  all  the 
ports  of  the  warm  seas  that  he  was  at  the  head  of  "an 
asylum  to  the  armed  vessels  of  the  party  of  independence." 
The  asylum  included  facilities  for  repairing  vessels,  stores 
for  the  sale  of  supplies,  and  numerous  taverns  and  other 
places  of  resort  for  the  crews.  In  short,  a  town  —  seaport 
—  wis  built  there  by  capitalists  and  mechanics,  but  all 
paid  tribute  to  Lafitte.  As  at  Barataria,  slave-ships  were 
more  highly  prized  than  any  others  because  of  the  ease 
with  which  the  "goods"  could  be  smuggled  into  the  United 
States.  When  General  James  Long,  a  noted  Texas 
filibuster,  visited  the  settlement,  he  found  that  "doubloons 
were  as  plentiful  as  biscuit,"  while  the  harbor  was  strewn 
with  the  wrecks  of  prizes. 


i86     THE   STORY   OF   THE   MERCHANT  MARINE 

After  a  time  Lafitte  went  through  with  the  forms  of  or- 
ganizing the  "Repubhc  of  Texas,"  and  elected  a  governor, 
who  appointed  a  justice  to  preside  over  the  court  of 
admiralty  that  the  constitution  of  the  "Republic"  had 
provided.  Then  cruisers  were  commissioned  and  prizes 
were  condemned,  but  when  these  condemned  prizes  were 
sent  to  New  Orleans,  they  were  seized  by  the  United  States 
authorities,  and  some  of  the  pirate  crews  were  hanged. 
Nevertheless,  it  was  not  until  1821 — after  nearly  five 
years  of  unmolested  prosperity  —  that  Lafitte  was  driven 
away,  and  even  then  he  was  allowed  to  carry  away  all  of 
his  portable  plunder.  To  add  to  the  interest  of  the 
story,  when  Lafitte  left  the  island  he  disappeared  forever. 
Rumor  said  he  was  seen  in  Mexico,  and  in  the  thick  of 
a  fight  at  sea,  and  in  France,  but  the  truth  is  that  he  had 
gone  to  the  port  of  missing  ships.  When  the  Luis  de  Aury 
mentioned  above  left  Galveston  Island,  he  cruised  around 
for  a  while,  and  then,  on  September  2,  181 7,  landed  on 
Amelia  Island,  Florida,  where  Fernandina  now  stands. 
A  Scotch  adventurer  named  MacGregor  had  been  trying 
to  build  a  town  there  and  organize  the  "Republic  of  the 
Two  Floridas,"  but  without  success.  He  sailed  away 
when  Aury  came,  and  Aury  continued  the  work  of  nation- 
building,  combined  with  smuggling  goods  captured  by 
"the  party  of  independence."  He  thought  the  location 
admirable  because  of  the  proximity  to  the  United  States, 
but  he  soon  learned  that  the  convenience  due  to  distance 
was  more  than  counterbalanced  by  the  attention  attracted. 


PRIVATEERS,   PIRATES,   AND   SLAVERS  187 

Many  speculators  came  to  the  camp  and  bought  his  goods, 
but  the  customs  officials  pressed  them  closely.  Moreover, 
while  Aury  supplied  the  planters  with  cheap  slaves,  he 
was  so  short-sighted  as  to  encourage  Georgia  slaves  to 
leave  their  masters  to  join  his  forces.  The  Georgia 
planters  who  suffered  losses  in  this  way  had  no  difficulty 
in  persuading  the  Washington  authorities  to  invade  Span- 
ish Florida  and  drive  the  pirate  away  —  December  23, 
181 7.  But  Aury,  like  Lafitte,  was  allowed  to  carry  away 
his  plunder. 

The  effect  of  the  piracies  upon  American  commerce 
can  be  traced  in  the  annual  reports  of  exports  and  imports. 
Thus  the  exports  of  American  products  to  the  Spanish 
West  Indies  amounted  to  $3,606,588  in  the  fiscal  year 
1816-1817,  while  American  exports  of  foreign  goods  to 
the  same  ports  reached  the  sum  of  $3,477,511.  The  cor- 
responding figures  for  1819-1820  were  $3,439,365  of 
American  products  and  $2,545,717  of  American  exports  of 
foreign  goods.  American  tonnage  fell  off,  also,  of  course. 
The  common  saying  that  there  is  no  friendship  in  business 
is  untrue.  American  commerce  and  the  use  of  American 
ships  were  increasing  in  that  period  at  an  astonishing  rate 
in  all  other  trades,  but  Spanish  resentment  produced  a 
"boycott"  that  is  shown  by  the  official  returns. 

But  this  boycott  was  the  mildest  form  of  expression  of 
Spanish  resentment.  Within  a  short  time  after  the 
American-owned  cruisers  under  the  Spanish-American 
flags  began  ravaging   Spanish   commerce,  the   Spaniards 


l88     THE   STORY   OF   THE   MERCHANT  MARINE 

retaliated  by  making  reprisals  after  the  fashion  common 
in  the  sixteenth  century.  Encouraged  by  the  island 
authorities,  the  ship-owners  of  Cuba  fitted  out  armed 
vessels  to  prey  upon  American  commerce.  The  Cuban 
pirates  were  in  no  case  commissioned,  but  the  Porto  Rico 
authorities  gave  commissions  to  half  a  dozen  or  more. 
The  Cuban  pirates,  however,  worked  openly.  Regla, 
a  village  on  the  east  side  of  Havana  Bay,  was  the  chief 
pirate  port.  In  November,  182 1,  eleven  Spanish  pirate 
vessels  were  cruising  between  Cape  Maisi  and  Santiago, 
five  were  working  as  a  squadron  at  Cape  San  Antonio, 
and  at  least  five  more  were  cruising  on  the  north  coast  east 
of  Matanzas.  Between  Havana  and  Matanzas  was  a 
flotilla  of  small  boats  the  crews  of  which  kept  constant 
watch  for  vessels  becalmed  in  the  offing.  All  such  vessels 
were  attacked  as  soon  as  night  came.  Another  gang 
of  small-boat  pirates  operated  at  Cape  Cruz,  where  they 
lived  in  the  caves  for  which  the  region  is  noted. 

The  extent  of  the  depredations  of  these  pirates 
was  never  completely  known,  of  course,  but  in  Niles^s 
Register  of  May  24,  1823,  it  is  stated  that  3002  piratical 
assaults  had  been  committed  upon  merchant  ships  in  the 
West  Indies  since  the  War  of  181 2.  The  "Naval  Affairs" 
volumes  of  the  American  State  Papers  contain  many 
accounts  of  such  assaults,  and  it  appears  from  these  that 
the  pirates  not  infrequently  tortured  captured  sailors. 
In  March,  1823,  the  captain  and  two  men  of  the  brig 
Alert,  of  Portsmouth,  New  Hampshire,  were  killed  iii 


PRIVATEERS,   PIRATES,   AND   SLAVERS  189 

the  mouth  of  Havana  harbor.  The  captain  of  the  brig 
Bellisaurius,  captured  near  Cape  San  Antonio,  had  his 
arms  cut  off,  after  which  he  was  placed  on  a  bed  of  oakum 
and  burned  to  death. 

The  markets  of  Cuba  were  frequently  flooded  with 
merchandise  taken  by  the  pirates,  and  a  number  of 
schooners  ph'ed  between  Cape  San  Antonio  and  Regla  to 
carry  supph'es  to  the  pirate  flotilla  at  work  there  and  bring 
back  captured  goods. 

The  efforts  of  the  Washington  authorities  to  deal  with 
the  situation  created  by  the  American-owned  pirate  ships 
were,  as  noted,  hampered  at  first  by  public  sympathy  for 
the  Spanish- American  insurgents.  Even  after  the  Spaniards 
began  making  reprisals,  nothing  effective  was  done  until 
May  15,  1820,  when  Congress  provided  for  the  building 
of  five  swift  war  schooners,  a  force  that  was  by  no  means 
sufficient  to  cope  with  the  evil.  Other  ships  of  the  navy 
were  ordered  to  the  region,  and  these  were  still  further 
reenforced  with  a  flotilla  of  small  schooners  bought  in 
Chesapeake  Bay.  A  number  of  huge  rowboats  were  built 
to  destroy  the  pirates  operating  in  small  boats  near  Havana, 
but  the  depredations  continued;  the  aid  of  the  Cuban 
authorities  was  sufficient  to  keep  the  pirates  at  work.  It 
was  not  until  the  independence  of  the  Spanish- American 
republics  was  acknowledged,  and  the  Spanish-American 
privateers  thereby  lost  their  commissions,  that  piracy 
came  to  an  end  in  the  West  Indies. 

The  last  American  vessel  to  suffer  at  their  hands  was 


I90     THE   STORY   OF   THE   MERCHANT  MARINE 

the  Mexico,  Captain  John  G.  Butman,  of  Salem.  She 
sailed  from  home  with  $20,000  in  coin,  for  Rio  Janeiro, 
on  August  29,  1832.  On  September  20  she  was  captured 
by  the  schooner  Panda,  Captain  Pedro  Gibert,  of  Havana. 
After  taking  out  the  coin,  Gibert  fastened  the  crew  in  the 
forecastle  and  set  the  Mexico  on  fire ;  but  the  crew  released . 
themselves  in  time  to  put  out  the  fire.  The  Panda  was 
captured  later  on  the  coast  of  Africa,  a  number  of  the 
pirates  were  sent  to  Salem  for  trial,  and  Pedro  Gibert 
and  four  others  were  hanged.  It  is  an  interesting  fact 
that  two  members  of  the  Mexico'' s  crew  lived  until  1905 
and  one  until  1908.  Life  at  sea  agreed  well  with  the 
New  Englanders. 

As  the  facts  thus  far  given  show  plainly,  the  slave-trade 
had  intimate  relations  with  the  pirates  who  operated  under 
the  Spanish-American  flags,  and  later  with  those  fitted 
out  from  Cuba;  for  the  Panda  cleared  out  from  Havana 
for  a  cargo  of  slaves.  But  she  carried  no  trade  goods; 
her  clearance  for  the  African  coast  was  merely  a  cover 
for  the  real  purpose  in  view.  Still,  she  might  have  brought 
a  cargo  of  slaves  to  Cuba  but  for  the  interference  of  a 
British  war-ship.  But  the  American  slave-trade  lasted 
for  thirty  years  after  the  captain  of  the  Panda  was  hanged, 
and  such  acts  of  piracy  as  his  had  long  been  out  of  fashion 
in  American  waters. 

By  the  act  of  Congress  dated  March  2,  1807  (it  passed 
the  House  by  a  vote  of  sixty-three  to  forty-nine),  the  im- 
portations of  slaves  into  the  United  States  after  January  i, 


PRIVATEERS,   PIRATES,   AND   SLAVERS  191 

1808,  was  forbidden.  The  penalties  provided  included 
forfeiture  of  the  vessel,  and  fines,  together  with  imprison- 
ment, for  those  involved. 

As  this  legislation  had  been  provided  for  in  the  Con- 
stitution of  the  nation,  the  trade  in  slaves  was  naturally 
brisk  in  the  years  immediately  preceding  prohibition. 
Thus,  from  January  i,  1804,  to  December  31,  1807, 
202  ships  imported  39,075  slaves  into  the  port  of  Charles- 
ton, South  Carolina.  Of  these  ships,  61  were  registered  at 
Charleston  (though  generally  owned  elsewhere),  59  were 
owned  in  Rhode  Island,  from  i  to  4  in  each  of  several 
other  American  ports,  and  70  in  England.  While  the 
prospect  of  prohibition  increased  the  importations  at  this 
time  beyond  the  normal,  it  is  evident  that  a  strong  demand 
for  slaves  existed  among  slave-owners.  The  demand  was 
particularly  strong  in  the  Mississippi  Valley,  where  the 
profits  on  cotton  were  enormous.  This  demand  naturally 
raised  the  price  as  soon  as  lawful  importations  came  to 
an  end.  At  the  same  time  the  existence  of  the  American 
prohibitory  law  (England  prohibited  the  trade  at  about 
the  same  time,  too)  depressed  the  price  on  the  coast  of 
Africa.  Thus  a  premium  was  placed  on  smuggling,  and 
202  ships  were  afloat  that  had  been  engaged  in  the  trade 
to  one  port  alone. 

All  this  is  to  say  that  while  the  law  drove  many  ships 
out  of  the  trade,  it  added  much  to  the  profits  of  those  that 
remained  in  it. 

Because  the  trade  was  continued,  an  effort  was  made  to 


192     THE   STORY   OF   THE   MERCHANT  MARINE 

strengthen  the  law  in  1818  by  increasing  the  emoluments 
of  informers.  Then,  by  the  Act  of  March  3,  18 19,  Con- 
gress authorized  the  President  to  use  the  naval  ships  to 
intercept  slavers,  and  finally  by  the  Act  of  May  15,  1820, 
all  Americans  engaging  in  the  trade  were  declared  pirates, 
who  should  be  hanged  on  conviction. 

One  would  be  glad  to  believe  that  these  laws  were  en- 
acted because  the  American  people  had  become  sufficiently 
enlightened  to  appreciate  the  effects  of  the  trade  upon  the 
human  race,  and  especially  upon  the  white  people  con- 
nected with  it,  but  it  is  impossible  to  do  so.  The  laws  were 
enacted  because  of  a  passing  wave  of  sentiment  that  had 
its  origin  in  the  work  of  the  pirates  herein  described.  In 
a  dim  way  people  saw  that  a  connection  existed  between 
some  of  the  pirates  and  the  slave-trade.  The  slave-trade 
was  held  responsible  (properly,  too)  for  some  of  the  horrors 
of  the  piracies,  and  while  Congress  was  legislating  against 
the  pirates,  it  was  easy  to  get  acts  against  the  trade  passed. 
Moreover,  the  desire  of  the  slave-owners  to  rid  their 
States  of  free  negroes  was  just  then  giving  strength  to  the 
movement  for  sending  those  negroes  to  Africa  —  Liberia. 
In  short,  the  prohibitory  laws  were  the  result  of  a  sort  of 
hysteria  rather  than  of  any  real  enlightenment  of  the  Amer- 
ican people.  In  truth,  we  are  not  so  enlightened  even  now 
as  to  appreciate  our  whole  duty  toward  the  inferior  race 
—  properly  a  race  of  children  —  we  brought  from  Africa. 

As  said,  prohibiting  the  trade  did  but  increase  the  profits 
of  those  who  disregarded  the  law,  but  a  more  memorable 


PRIVATEERS,   PIRATES,   AND   SLAVERS  193 

result  of  prohibition  was  the  effect  upon  the  unfortunate 
victims  of  the  trade  —  the  increase  in  the  horrors  of  the 
middle  passage.  A  brief  description  of  the  ships  used  in 
the  trade  will  help  one  to  understand  how  the  slaves  were 
affected. 

The  American  slave-ships  were  usually  small  vessels, 
say  100  feet  or  so  long,  and  10  or  12  deep.  On  the  way 
to  the  coast  what  was  called  the  slave-deck  was  laid. 
By  means  of  beams,  stanchions,  and  rough  planks  a  tem- 
porary deck  was  built  3  feet  below  the  regular  deck. 
The  naked  slaves  were  placed  upon  this  deck.  In  the  days 
of  the  lawful  trade  they  were  compelled  to  lie  down  on 
their  backs,  shoulder  to  shoulder,  with  heads  outboard 
in  a  row  all  around  the  slave-deck.  Then  other  rows  of 
the  kind  were  made  on  the  deck  inside  of  the  first  row 
until  the  deck  was  entirely  covered.  When  the  law  pro- 
hibited the  trade,  the  slavers  increased  the  number  carried 
to  the  utmost  capacity  of  their  vessels,  in  order  to  increase 
the  profits  and  cover  the  risks.  To  do  this  they  compelled 
the  negroes  to  lie  down  on  their  sides  breast  to  back,  — 
"spoon  fashion,"  — or  else  they  were  made  to  sit  in  rows, 
breast  to  back,  from  the  wall  of  the  ship  to  the  centre. 
When  sitting  thus,  the  only  air-space  between  the  two  decks 
was  that  over  the  rows  of  shoulders  and  between  the  rows 
of  heads.  When  lying  down,  the  air-space  was  greater, 
but  whenever  the  vessel  heeled  to  the  wind,  those  on  the 
lee  side  had  to  lie  with  their  feet  higher  than  their  heads, 
and  when  the  vessel  rolled  to  the  waves  all  of  them  sawed 


194     THE   STORY  OF   THE   MERCHANT  MARINE 

to  and  fro  over  the  cracks  between  the  unplaned  deck 
boards.  Moreover,  the  slaves  were  kept  fastened  to  the 
deck  —  they  were  not  allowed  to  leave  their  cramped 
berths  for  any  purpose  save  only  at  fixed  hours,  when  they 
were  fed  and,  in  small  gangs,  were  taken  to  the  upper 
deck  for  a  short  airing.  In  storms  the  washing  of  the 
waves  across  the  deck  compelled  the  crew  to  put  on  the 
hatches  and  keep  them  on  sometimes  for  days  at  a  stretch. 

Meantime  the  allowance  of  water  was  a  pint  a  day.  In 
short,  the  slave-ship  was  a  horrible  floating  cesspool. 
How  the  inhuman  drivers  added  to  the  sufferings  of  the 
wretched  slaves  by  the  use  of  the  whip,  and  other  means 
of  torture,  may  be  suggested  by  one  story. 

When  the  slaver  Brillante,  Captain  Homans,  with  600 
slaves  in  her  hold,  was  overhauled  by  British  cruisers 
during  a  calm,  and  Homans  saw  that  the  boats  of  the 
cruisers  would  soon  come  to  the  vessel,  he  got  the  anchor 
in  position  as  if  for  anchoring  the  vessel.  Then  the  iron 
cable  was  stretched  along  the  rail  outside  of  all  and  held 
in  place  by  slender  cords.  To  this  chain  all  the  slaves 
were  carefully  secured  by  means  of  ropes  and  chains. 
Then,  just  before  the  cruisers'  boats  came  into  view 
(it  was  at  night),  the  anchor  was  cast  loose  and  the  600 
slaves  were  dragged  down  to  the  bottom  of  the  sea. 

To  save  a  vessel  worth  at  most  $5000  from  confiscation, 
Homans  murdered  600  negroes.  The  story  is  told  in  detail 
in  the  African  Repository,  Vol.  XXIII,  p.  371. 

The  profits  in  the  trade  are  shown  by  the  fact  that  slaves 


PRIVATEERS,   PIRATES,   AND   SLAVERS  195 

costing  from  $12  to  $20  on  the  coast  of  Africa  sold  for  $350, 
when  delivered  alive  and  able  to  walk,  in  Cuba.  When 
smuggled  into  the  United  States,  they  sold  all  the  way  from 
$750  to  $1000. 

Old  ships  of  known  speed  were  in  demand.  Speed  was 
necessary  because  the  British  government  maintained 
cruisers  on  the  coast  that  captured  and  confiscated  vessels 
found  with  slaves  actually  on  board.  Our  navy  depart- 
ment sold  the  schooner  Enterprise  (the  second  of  the 
name)  to  men  in  the  slave-trade  at  a  small  fraction  of  her 
value.  The  swift  privateers  of  the  War  of  181 2  were  also 
bought  for  the  purpose.  In  later  years  it  was  the  custom 
to  build  swift  vessels  especially  for  the  trade.  Baltimore 
and  New  York  builders  were  patronized  more  than  others, 
New  York  having  the  lead  in  later  years.  The  builders 
always  knew  what  trade  the  vessels  were  to  enter,  and 
charged  accordingly.  No  builder  ever  lost  standing  in 
society  because  he  turned  out  ships  for  this  purpose.  In 
fact,  the  slave-traders  were  well  known,  and  they  lived 
among  the  wealthiest  society  people  of  New  York  —  at 
the  Astor  House,  for  instance,  where  they  were  in  the  habit  of 
meeting  to  arrange  the  details  of  their  voyages.  Public 
documents  show  that  the  most  respected  merchants  of  the 
city  were  ready  to  go  on  the  bonds  of  these  slavers,  when 
bonds  were  required.  A  New  Bedford  whale-ship  owner 
who  was  convicted  of  fitting  out  one  of  his  vessels  for  the 
trade  was  afterward  elected  mayor  of  his  city.  Even  after 
the  Civil  War  was  begun,  a  United  States  district  attorney  — 


196     THE   STORY   OF   THE   MERCHANT  MARINE 

a  man  appointed  by  Lincoln  —  was  seen  dining  at  the  lead- 
ing New  York  restaurant  with  a  slaver  whom  he  should 
have  been  prosecuting  at  that  moment;  for  while  the  two 
ate  together,  the  slaver  talked  about  a  slave  voyage  that  he 
intended  to  make. 

Though  American  packets  had  for  years  controlled  the 
trade  between  the  United  States  and  Europe,  and 
the  American  clippers  were  making  records  that  stirred 
the  whole  nautical  world,  the  flag  from  those  proud  ships 
was  used  to  cover  the  reeking  slime  in  the  slaver's  hold,  and 
it  was  the  only  flag  that  could  protect  the  slaver  from  inspec- 
tion on  the  African  coast.  These  facts  were  well  known, 
but  they  roused  not  a  tremor  of  indignation  among  the 
American  people,  not  one,  save  only  in  the  breasts  of  a  few 
"fanatics,"  and  the  arguments  of  the  fanatics  were  an- 
swered by  asking,  "  How  would  you  like  to  have  your  sister 
marry  a  nigger?" 

The  story  might  well  be  forgotten  —  it  would  have  been 
omitted  here  but  for  the  fact  that  the  humiliation  of  it 
may  serve  in  righting  wrongs  as  yet  unheeded,  or  but  partly 
heeded,  which,  if  less  brutal,  are  born  of  the  same  greed  and 
the  same  disregard  for  human  rights  that  made  the  slave- 
trade  possible  in  the  United  States  until  after  the  middle  of 
the  nineteenth  century. 


CHAPTER  XI 

THE  HARVEST  OF   THE   SEA   BEFORE   THE    CIVIL  WAR 

In  the  year  1772  the  people  of  Marblehead,  Massa- 
chusetts, boasted  that  "the  number  of  polls  was  1203," 
and  that  the  vessels  of  all  kinds  owned  in  the  port  meas- 
ured more  than  12,000  tons.  In  1780  the  number  of  polls 
was  544,  the  tonnage  but  1509.  Within  the  borders  of 
the  town  were  458  widows  with  966  fatherless  children. 

Marblehead  was  a  type  of  the  New  England  fishing  vil- 
lages of  the  day.  The  nation  had  won  freedom,  but  the 
fishing  industry  from  which  the  American  merchant  marine 
had  originated  was  ruined.  Moreover,  there  was  no  im- 
mediate return  of  prosperity  after  peace  was  declared. 
The  gross  income  of  the  New  England  cod-fishing  vessels 
for  the  year  1787  averaged  but  $483  each;  for  1788  it  was 
$456  each,  and  for  1789  only  $273.  The  average  annual 
expense  during  this  period  was  $416  each,  and  the  vessels 
lost  on  the  average  $143  each  during  the  year  1789.  In 
that  year  the  fleet  measured  19,185  tons.  In  the  next  year 
the  tonnage  increased  to  28,348,  for  the  fishermen  hoped 
for  good  times  following  the  adoption  of  the  Constitution, 
and  in  1793,  when  the  fleet  received  a  national  subsidy  of 
$72,965.32,  the  tonnage  reached  50,163.       But  in  1794, 

197 


198     THE   STORY   OF   THE   MERCHANT   MARINE 

although  the  subsidy  amounted  to  $93,768.91,  the  tonnage 
was  only  28,671.  In  short,  the  statistics  show  that  while 
the  tonnage  fluctuated  from  year  to  year,  there  was  little 
prosperity  for  any  of  our  fishermen  in  the  period  between 
the  two  wars  for  freedom, 

A  similar  condition  prevailed  at  Nantucket  and  other 
whaling  ports.  So  discouraged  were  the  Nantucket  men 
that  many  of  them  migrated  to  England  and  France. 
For  the  British  and  French  governments,  to  secure  them, 
ofi'ered  free  transportation,  free  entry  for  ships  and  goods, 
and  sums  of  money  with  which  to  begin  life  anew. 
Records  show  that  no  less  than  149  Nantucket  men  com- 
manded English  whalers  before  the  War  of  1812. 

The  foreign  aggressions  of  various  kinds  account  for  a 
large  part  of  the  depression  of  the  fisheries  during  that 
unhappy  period.  The  losses  sustained  by  our  freight  car- 
riers at  that  time  were  more  than  made  up  by  the  high 
freight  rates  received.  But  when  the  fish  markets  of  the 
West  Indies  and  of  Europe  were  closed  by  adverse  legisla- 
tion, or  by  wars,  there  was  no  way  to  repair  the  loss  except 
by  national  subsidies,  and  these,  when  granted,  proved 
inadequate. 

There  was  one  other  loss  to  which  too  little  attention 
has  been  paid  —  the  loss  of  men.  The  Marblchead  men 
who  were  killed  during  the  War  of  the  Revolution  were 
among  the  most  enterprising  of  the  coast  —  they  were 
killed  because  of  their  courage  and  dash.  Lost  ships  could 
be  replaced  in  the  course  of  one  winter ;  the  lost  men  were 


THE   HARVEST  OF   THE   SEA 


199 


not  replaced  until  their  sons  became  men.  Then,  too,  the 
prosperity  of  the  carrier  fleet  drained  away  the  best  men 
among  the  fishermen ;  for  the  owners  of  the  carriers  knew 
where  to  get  able  seamen. 

After  the  War  of  181 2  the  cod  fleet  averaged  somewhat 
larger  than  it  was  before  the  war,  but  the  increase  was  not 
at  all  commensurate  with  the  growth  of  the  nation.  The 
exports  of  dried  fish  declined  instead  of  increasing,  and  in 
spite  of  a  protective  tariff  foreigners  began  (1812)  to  sell 
pickled  fish  in  the  United  States.  These  imports  increased 
steadily  until  1848,  when  more  than  100,000  barrels  were 
brought  in,  and  the  imports  thereafter  remained  above  that 
figure.  In  describing  the  situation  of  these  fishermen  in 
1848,  Sabine  says :  — 

"Many  crews  of  fishing  vessels  owned  in  Newburyport, 
on  settling  with  their  owners  for  six  and  seven  months'  hard 
toil  at  sea,  received  only  about  ten  dollars  per  month ;  and 
on  this  miserable  pittance  they  were  to  eke  out  the  year. 
They  had  obtained  good  fares  of  fish,  but  were  sufferers 
from  the  depressed  state  of  the  market.  With  facts  like 
these  before  us,  can  we  wonder  that  the  more  ambitious 
young  men  abandon  the  employment  at  every  opportunity  ?  " 

The  vessels  in  the  mackerel  and  other  fisheries  were,  of 
course,  no  more  prosperous,  on  the  average,  than  those 
fishing  for  cod.  From  first  to  last  the  fisheries  of  New 
England  are  of  interest  in  the  story  of  the  American  mer- 
chant marine  chiefly  because  they  afforded  an  excellent 
training  school  for  the  sailor  of  the  sail.     It  was  because  of 


200     THE   STORY   OF   THE   MERCHANT  MARINE 

the  school  afforded  that  these  vessels  were  subsidized  be- 
tween 1792  and  1866.  The  annual  bounty  ranged  from 
$1.60  to  $4  per  ton,  according  to  the  size  of  the  vessel. 
Pay  from  the  national  treasury  at  the  rate  of  $2  per  month 
has  also  been  given  to  the  crews  of  fishermen  in  order  to 
create  a  sort  of  sea  militia.  During  the  Civil  War  many  re- 
cruits for  the  navy  were  obtained  from  the  fishermen.  Im- 
pressed by  the  precedent  thus  afforded,  and  failing  to  dis- 
tinguish between  the  requirements  of  the  old-time  and  the 
modern  man-o'-war,  the  Merchant  Marine  Commission 
of  1904  proposed  to  pay  bounties  to  the  crews  now  em- 
ployed in  the  fisheries.  Of  course  bounties  paid  to  the  crews 
of  tugs  and  other  harbor  steamers  would  be  far  more  effec- 
tive for  the  end  in  view.  The  tenacity  with  which  our 
people  cling  to  the  idea  that  a  modern  sailor  needs  training 
on  a  ship  of  the  sail  is  one  of  the  discouraging  features  of 
the  outlook  for  a  revival  of  our  merchant  marine.  No  one 
would  suppose  that  a  training  on  a  Dakota  wheat  farm  was 
essential  to  the  making  of  a  finished  hot-house  florist. 

During  the  period  before  the  Civil  War  the  whaling  fleet 
was  enjoying  what  has  been  called  the  Golden  Era  of  its 
prosperity.  This  fact  is  all  the  more  interesting  because 
the  prosperity  was  due  to  the  character  of  the  whalemen  as 
developed  by  their  environment.  Because  Nantucket  as 
farm  land  could  afford  no  more  than  a  bare  living  to  a  small 
number  of  people,  the  more  ambitious  residents  were  obliged 
to  look  elsewhere  for  a  career ;  and  when  they  looked  they 
saw  right  whales  just  beyond  —  sometimes  in  —  the  surf. 


THE   HARVEST  OF  THE   SEA  201 

A  storm  —  a  seeming  disaster  —  was  the  means  of  leading 
the  right  whalers  to  go  in  search  of  sperm  whales,  and  that 
cultivated  enterprise,  because  it  took  them  ever  farther  and 
farther  from  home. 

The  spirit  of  enterprise  was  also  cultivated  by  the  "lay" 
system  of  paying  the  crew.  Every  man  received  a  share  of 
the  oil  instead  of  set  wages.  The  system  sharpened  the 
eyes  of  the  lookout,  gave  strength  to  the  arm  of  the  man 
at  the  oars,  and  cooled  the  nerves  of  the  man  who  thrust 
the  lance  under  the  shoulder-blade  of  the  whale. 

When  Captain  James  Shields  reached  the  Brazil  grounds 
too  late  in  the  season,  the  system  of  "no  oil,  no  pay"  drove 
him  around  Cape  Horn  in  search  of  a  new  ground.  When, 
in  1818,  Captain  George  W.  Gardener  found  the  grounds  on 
the  west  coast  of  South  America  barren,  he  boldly  headed 
across  the  unexplored  Pacific  in  search  of  others  —  with 
success.  In  1819  a  merchantman  from  China  stopped  at 
the  Sandwich  Islands  and  told  a  number  of  whalemen  there 
that  he  had  seen  great  schools  of  whales  on  the  coast  of 
Japan.  Thereupon  the  whalemen  raced  away  for  the  new 
grounds.  In  1843  two  New  Bedford  captains  found  for- 
tune on  the  coast  of  Kamchatka  and  another  in  the 
Okhotsk  sea.  Two  years  later  still.  Captain  Royce,  of  the 
Sag  Harbor  bark  Superior,  entered  the  Arctic  by  way  of 
Bering's  Strait. 

The  countries  of  Europe  sent  naval  squadrons  at  great 
expense  to  explore  the  Seven  Seas;  the  whalemen  of  Amer- 
ica explored   the  waters  of   the  whole  world  more  thor- 


202     THE   STORY   OF   THE   MERCHANT  MARINE 

oughly,  if  less  scientifically,  at  their  own  expense,  and  made 
money  in  the  quest.  One  volume  of  the  American  State 
Papers  contains  a  list  of  more  than  400  islands  that  were 
discovered  by  them  in  the  Pacific  alone. 

Of  less  importance  in  its  influence,  perhaps,  but  not  to  be 
overlooked,  was  the  ease  with  which  the  ambitious  whale- 
men obtained  promotion.  The  larger  whalers  carried 
three  and  sometimes  four  mates,  together  with  a  petty 
officer  called  a  boat  steerer  for  each  of  the  boats.  Because 
the  boat  steerer  hurled  the  harpoon,  his  office  was  impor- 
tant, and  many  a  daring  youth  who  went  afloat  as  a  green 
hand  came  home  wearing  the  boat  steerer's  badge.  Last  of 
all,  but  most  important  in  its  formation  of  character,  was 
the  danger  of  the  pursuit.  The  whalers  braved  the  jaws 
of  the  vicious  sperm  bull;  they  drove  their  boats  under 
the  uplifted  flukes,  and  with  a  stroke  of  a  boat  spade  dis- 
abled the  monster.  They  pulled  to  the  tune  of  "A  dead 
whale  or  a  stove  boat,"  and  so  "made  good"  in  the  world's 
work  naturally  and  easily. 

The  Golden  Era  began  with  the  success  of  the  whalers 
that  sailed  for  the  Pacific  in  181 5,  and  returned  well  loaded 
in  1817.  In  1829  the  whaling  fleet  numbered  203  vessels; 
in  1840,  552;  in  1846  there  were  680  ships  and  barks,  34 
brigs,  and  22  schooners,  a  total  of  736  vessels,  hunting  the 
whale  under  the  American  flag.  New  London  owned  the 
largest  ship  of  the  fleet,  the  Atlantic,  measuring  699  tons, 
and  the  smallest,  the  schooner  Garland,  of  49  tons,  that  was 
at  work  on  the  coasts  of  Desolation  Island. 


THE  HARVEST  OF   THE   SEA 


203 


In  1835  the  value  of  the  annual  product  of  the  whalers 
exceeded  for  the  first  time  $6,000,000.  In  1845  the  sperm- 
whale  fishery  reached  its  highest  point  in  the  amount  of 
product  —  4,967,550  gallons.  The  price  was  then  88 
cents  a  gallon.  In  1855  the  price  was  $1,772  per  gallon, 
but  the  amount  saved  was  only  2,228,443  gallons.  Right 
whale-oil  reached  record  figures  in  1840,  when  the  amount 
saved  was  11,593,483  gallons.  The  price  was  then  33 
cents.  The  highest  income  received  by  the  whalers  in 
any  one  year  was  in  1854,  when  the  take  sold  for 
$10,802,594.20.  The  years  1854  to  1857,  inclusive,  paid  the 
whalers  $51,063,659.59.  The  average  catch  was  worth 
about  half  the  estimated  value  of  the  fleet,  or  say  near 
the  actual  value.  It  is  certain  that  a  well-handled  whaler 
was  a  most  profitable  ship  until  after  the  petroleum  in- 
dustry was  developed. 

A  picturesque  offshoot  of  the  whaling  fleet  was  the  fleet 
of  seal-hunters  that  came  into  existence  at  the  end  of  the 
eighteenth  century.  When  Captains  Gamaliel  Collins  and 
David  Smith,  of  Cape  Cod,  went  to  the  Falklands  (1774) 
in  search  of  whales,  they  found  there  thousands  of  seals, 
both  hair  and  fur,  and  sea-lions  without  end.  The  oil  of 
these  animals  being  of  good  quality,  the  whalers  carried 
some  of  it  home,  together  with  the  skins,  which  were  found 
to  serve  well  for  covering  trunks.  The  fur-seals  as  well  as 
the  hair  sealskins  were  used  for  this  purpose.  Soon  after 
the  War  of  the  Revolution  a  Mrs.  Haley,  of  Boston,  sent 
a  large  ship   to  the  Falklands  especially  for  seals.     The 


204     THE   STORY   OF   THE   MERCHANT  MARINE 

number  taken  was  13,000,  and  the  skins  sold  for  fifty  cents 
each  in  New  York.  This  voyage,  like  that  of  the  Columbia 
to  the  Northwest  coast,  shows  well  the  extraordinary  en- 
terprise of  the  ship-owners  of  the  day. 

In  1790  Elijah  Austin,  of  New  Haven,  sent  two  vessels 
to  the  Falklands  for  seals,  and  when  they  were  filled,  Cap- 
tain Daniel  Greene,  who  commanded  one  of  them,  took  his 
cargo  direct  to  Canton  for  sale,  because  the  skins  Mrs. 
Haley's  ship  had  taken  had  been  exported  from  New  York 
to  Canton  with  profit. 

The  work  of  the  brig  Betsey,  of  Stonington,  Connecticut, 
is  perhaps  the  most  memorable  of  any  of  the  ships  that 
entered  the  early  trade.  Though  of  but  100  tons'  measure- 
ment, she  made  two  voyages  to  the  southern  seal  islands, 
beginning  in  1790,  both  of  which  were  remarkably  profit- 
able —  the  better  voyage  paid  $52,300  net.  The  outfit, 
vessel  included,  probably  cost  little  more  than  a  tenth  of 
this  sum. 

The  Betseys  success  naturally  increased  the  number  of 
vessels  in  the  hunt  very  rapidly.  Mas-a-Fuera,  Juan  Fer- 
nandez, the  South  Shetlands,  the  Prince  Edward  and 
Crozet  islands,  Desolation  and  Heard's  islands,  all  soon 
became  as  well  known  to  the  sealers  as  Long  Island  Sound 
was  to  the  coasters.  Captain  Henry  Fanning,  of  the  ship 
Catharine,  obtained  a  manuscript  copy  of  the  notes  made 
by  the  original  discoverer  of  Crozet's  Island,  and  with  that 
as  a  guide  went  to  the  islands  and  obtained  a  full  cargo. 

The  most  famous  of  the  American  seal-hunters  was  Cap- 


THE   HARVEST   OF   THE   SEA  205 

tain  N.  B.  Palmer,  born  in  Stonington,  Connecticut.  In 
1799  he  began  his  career  afloat  as  the  cabin-boy  of  a  coaster 
at  the  age  of  fourteen.  At  nineteen  he  was  made  second 
mate  of  the  brig  Hersilia,  Captain  J.  P.  Sheffield,  bound 
from  Stonington  to  the  Falklands  in  search  of  seals.  On 
reaching  the  Falklands,  Palmer  and  a  number  of  sailors 
were  landed  to  search  the  group  for  seals,  while  Captain 
Sheffield  went  south  to  search  for  another  group.  Accord- 
ing to  a  story  told  by  "gaming"  parties  on  the  whalers  of 
the  day,  a  whale-ship  that,  in  spite  of  a  heavy  fog,  was 
cruising  through  the  waters  to  the  south  of  the  Falklands, 
had  sailed  out  of  the  fog  unexpectedly,  and  found  herself 
ahnost  on  top  of  a  mountainous  group  of  islands,  the  out- 
lying rocks  and  the  beaches  of  which  were  alive  with  seals. 
The  crew  of  the  ship,  animated  by  the  danger  of  their  po- 
sition, hastily  tacked  and  sailed  away.  Then  the  fog  en- 
closed them  again,  and  when  the  captain  thought  to  chart 
the  strange  group  he  had  to  guess  at  the  position.  Sheffield 
was  in  search  of  this  group. 

A  few  days  after  he  was  left  at  the  Falklands,  Palmer  saw 
the  brig  Espirito  Santo  (owned  by  Englishmen  at  Buenos 
Ayres)  come  to  the  anchorage  in  search  of  water;  and 
when  she  was  anchored.  Palmer  noted  that  she  carried 
a  sealing  outfit.  Thereupon  he  made  friends  with  the 
mate,  and  although  sealers  had  the  habit  of  keeping  their 
destination  secret,  he  learned  that  the  brig  was  bound  for 
the  uncharted  islands ;  also  the  course  she  was  to  steer  from 
the  Falklands.     Accordingly,  when  the  Hersilia  returned 


2o6     THE   STORY   OF   THE   MERCHANT   MARINE 

unsuccessful,  Palmer  was  able  to  follow  the  Espirito  Santo 
to  the  new  group.  These  islands  are  now  known  as  the 
South  Shetlands. 

In  the  following  year  (1820)  thirty  sealers  gathered  at 
the  South  Shetlands,  including  five  belonging  to  the  Stoning- 
ton  South  Sea  Company.  One  of  the  five  was  the  Hero 
("  but  little  rising  forty  tons,"  according  to  one  old  account), 
of  which  young  Palmer  was  captain. 

While  working  the  group.  Captain  Isaac  Pendleton,  com- 
modore of  the  five  vessels  mentioned,  on  climbing  a  moun- 
tain, saw  what  he  thought  was  the  loom  of  land  far  away 
to  the  south,  and  in  the  hope  of  finding  other  rookeries, 
sent  Palmer  in  the  Hero  exploring. 

Land  was  found,  and  Palmer  soon  discovered  that  it 
was  of  continental  dimensions.  As  no  seals  were  found,  he 
finally  headed  back  for  the  Shetlands,  but  before  he  had 
crossed  the  intervening  water  a  heavy  fog  shut  himHn  and 
he  hove  to.  During  the  night  a  ship's  bell  was  heard  strik- 
ing the  hour  off  the  port  bow,  and  the  stroke  was  followed  by 
another  off  to  starboard.  To  the  crew  these  sounds  seemed 
supernatural,  for  they  could  not  think  that  real  ships  were 
there ;  but  when  morning  came,  they  found  the  Hero  lying 
between  two  war-ships.  The  story,  as  told  by  Captain 
E.  Fanning,  of  Stonington,  to  Secretary  of  the  Navy  J.  N. 
Reynolds,  in  a  letter  written  in  1828,  is  as  follows:  — 

"The  two  discovery  ships  sent  out  by  the  late  Emperor 
Alexander,  of  Russia,  being  between  the  South  Shetlands 
and  Palmer  Land,  were  becalmed  in  a  thick  fog ;  when  the 


THE   HARVEST  OF   THE   SEA  207 

fog  cleared  away  they  were  surprised  to  find  one  of  the 
Stonington  South  Sea  Company's  barques,  a  little  vessel  of 
about  fifty  tons,  between  the  two  discovery  ships,  which 
immediately  run  up  the  United  States  flag,  when  the  frigate 
and  sloop  of  war  set  theirs,  and  the  Russian  Commodore 
despatched  a  boat  and  officer,  with  an  invitation  to  Capt. 
Palmer,  of  the  American  vessel,  to  come  on  board,  which 
he  readily  accepted. 

"When  he  arrived  on  the  commodore's  deck  he  was 
asked  what  islands  those  were  in  sight,  and  if  he  had  any 
knowledge  of  them.  'Yes,  sir,'  replied  Capt.  Palmer, 
'those  are  the  Shetland  Islands.  I  am  well  acquainted 
with  them,  and  a  pilot  here.  I  belong,  sir,  to  a  fleet  of 
five  sail  out  of  Stonington,  under  the  command  of  Capt. 
B.  Pendleton,  whose  ship  is  now  at  anchor  in  a  good  harbor 
in  that  island ;  and  if  you  wish  for  water  and  refreshments,  I 
will  pilot  you  in,  and  my  commodore  will  be  much  pleased 
to  render  you  any  assistance.'  'I  kindly  thank  you,'  said 
the  Russian, '  but  previous  to  being  enveloped  in  the  fog  we 
had  sight  of  those  islands,  and  concluded  we  had  made  a 
new  discovery;  and  behold  when  the  fog  lifts,  to  our  utter 
surprise,  a  beautiful  little  American  vessel,  to  all  appear- 
ance in  as  fine  order  as  if  she  had  but  yesterday  left  her 
port  in  the  United  States,  is  discovered  alongside  of  my 
ships,  the  master  of  which  readily  offers  to  pilot  my  vessels 
into  port,  where  his  commodore  will  tender  me  every  aid 
for  refreshment !  We  must  surrender  the  palm  of  enter- 
prise to  you  Americans,'  said  the  Russian  commodore. 


2o8     THE   STORY   OF   THE   MERCHANT  MARINE 

'Sir,  you  flatter  me,'  replied  the  American  captain;  'but 
there  is  an  immense  extent  of  land  to  the  south,  and  when 
the  fog  is  entirely  cleared  away,  you  will  have  from  your 
masthead  a  fine  sight  of  its  mountains.'  'Indeed,'  ob- 
served the  commodore,  'you  Americans  are  a  people  that 
will  be  before  us;  and  here  is,  now,  in  your  information, 
and  in  what  is  now  before  my  eyes,  an  example  and  pattern 
or  the  oldest  nation  in  Europe.  Where  I  expected  to 
make  new  discoveries  I  find  the  American  flag,  a  fleet  and 
a  pilot ! ' " 

The  commodore  then  arose  from  his  seat,  and  placing  his 
hand  upon  Palmer's  shoulder,  continued :  — 

"I  name  the  land,  which  you  have  discovered,  Palmer 
Land,  in  your  honor.  But  what  will  my  august  master 
say,  and  what  will  he  think  of  my  two  years'  cruising  in 
search  of  land  that  has  been  discovered  by  a  boy  in  a  sloop 
but  little  larger  than  the  launch  of  my  frigate?" 

The  land  thus  named  was  a  part  of  the  Antarctic  Conti- 
nent. 

Among  the  interesting  stories  of  the  sealers  found  in 
Goode's  Fishery  Industries  of  the  United  States  is  one 
of  the  ship  Neptune,  Captain  Daniel  Greene,  of  New 
Haven,  which  shows  very  well  something  of  the  peculiarities 
of  this  branch  of  the  American  merchant  marine.  The 
voyage  lasted  from  November  29,  1796,  to  July  11,  1799. 

The  Neptune  was  a  ship  of  353  tons,  and  she  carried  a 
crew  of  36  all  told.  Going  to  the  Cape  de  Verde  Islands, 
Captain  Greene  bought  enough  salt  to  preserve  all   the 


THE  HARVEST  OF  THE  SEA 


209 


skins  the  ship  could  carry,  and  then  went  to  the  Falklands, 
where  he  arrived  February  22, 1797.  The  first  work  done 
there  was  the  building  of  a  shallop  for  working  shoal  waters. 
Then  seal-hunting  was  begun  in  connection  with  the  crew 
of  a  ship  from  Hudson,  New  York,  which,  by  the  way,  had 
brought  a  Hudson  River  sloop  as  a  tender. 

The  seals  were  found  either  on  beaches  which  the 
hunters  reached  easily,  or  on  outlying  rocks  upon  which  the 
seas  broke  with  tremendous  fury  even  in  the  most  pleasant 
weather.  Ordinary  whale-boats  were  commonly  used  in 
hunting  the  seals,  though  dories  were  preferred  for  the 
least  accessible  rocks.  When  the  weather  was  at  its  best, 
the  crews  worked  the  easily  reached  beaches;  incredible 
as  it  must  seem,  it  was  during  the  worst  storms  that  the 
almost  inaccessible  rocks  were  visited.  The  most  pictur- 
esque and  daring  work  known  to  the  sea  was  that  of  taking 
seals  on  these  rocks  Rowing  well  out  to  windward,  the 
officer  in  command  of  the  boat  noted  carefully  the  position 
of  the  sunken  reefs  with  which  all  these  rocks  were  sur- 
rounded, selected  a  safe  opening,  and  waited  until  the  high 
waves  that  always  come  in  threes  appeared.  Upon  the 
crest  of  the  last  of  a  set  of  these  the  boat  was  driven  in,  and 
as  it  was  swept  along  beside  the  rock  the  hunters,  with 
clubs  in  hand,  leaped  forth  to  land  as  best  they  might. 

At  other  times  the  boat  was  rowed  up  from  the  lee  side 
to  meet  the  crest  of  a  roller  at  the  side  of  the  rock.  The 
method  chosen  depended  upon  the  situation  of  the  rock. 

Taking  the  men  from  the  rocks  after  the  killing  was  often 


2IO     THE   STORY   OF   THE   MERCHANT   MARINE 

more  dangerous,  if  less  picturesque,  than  landing  them. 
For  it  was  impossible  to  hold  the  boat  beside  the  rock,  and 
in  leaping  out  the  men  often  fell  into  the  sea.  A  favorite 
way  of  getting  men  and  dead  seals  was  by  throwing  a  line 
from  the  boat  to  the  rock  and  then,  while  the  boat  was 
held  in  the  lee  of  the  rock,  the  men  and  carcasses  were 
dragged  through  the  water  by  the  line. 

The  crews  were  continually  drenched;  the  cold  winds 
pierced  them  to  the  bone;  they  fell  upon  the  rocks  and  were 
cut  and  bruised;  now  and  then  one  fell,  helpless,  into  the 
sea  and  was  drowned.  But  the  crews  of  those  days  were 
composed  of  youths  who  were  looking  ahead,  —  the  most 
ambitious  and  courageous  of  all  who  lived  around  the 
home  port,  —  and  without  flinching  they  took  the  chances 
until  the  ship  was  loaded. 

These  were  the  American  fur-hunters  of  the  sea.  Rarely 
if  at  all  elsewhere  in  the  history  of  the  nation  can  a  more  in- 
structive contrast  be  found  than  that  afforded  when  these 
men,  leaping  from  the  crest  of  the  storm-waves  to  the  seal 
rocks,  are  compared  with  those  who  traded  pot-metal 
muskets  and  adulterated  rum  to  the  Indians  in  exchange 
for  beaver  skins  upon  the  Western  frontier. 

Another  glimpse  of  life  at  sea  in  those  days  is  found  in  an 
adventure  of  the  Neptune^s  men  upon  the  coast  of  Pata- 
gonia. Captain  Greene  and  some  of  his  men  went  over 
there  looking  for  seals,  and  found  some  Spaniards  engaged 
in  seal-hunting  not  far  from  Port  Desire.  The  Spaniards 
said  the  commandante  of  the  fort  at  the  harbor  would  be 


THE  HARVEST  OF  THE   SEA  2ii 

pleased  to  give  Greene  permission  to  hunt  seals  in  the 
region,  and  Greene,  being  a  law-abiding  man,  went  to  the 
fort  to  see  about  the  matter. 

The  commandante,  however,  pretended  to  believe  that 
Greene  was  an  Englishman;  and  as  England  and  Spain 
were  at  war,  the  Americans  were  all  held  as  prisoners, 
while  soldiers  were  placed  in  charge  of  the  shallop  in  which 
the  Americans  had  come  to  the  coast.  As  it  appeared 
later,  it  was  to  get  possession  of  the  shallop  that  the  com- 
mafidanle  had  decided  that  Americans  were  Englishmen. 

Greene,  however,  was  equal  to  the  emergency.  When 
the  priest  at  the  fort  gathered  the  garrison  into  the  chapel 
at  8  o'clock  for  the  evening  services,  Greene  overpowered 
the  sentinels,  ran  out  of  the  gate  with  his  men,  launched 
his  whale-boat,  rowed  off  to  the  shallop,  set  the  soldiers 
ashore,  and  sailed  away. 

The  Neptune,  like  all  American  vessels  of  the  period, 
carried  cannon.  After  seeing  that  his  guns  were  in  service 
condition,  Greene  returned  to  Port  Desire  and  anchored 
in  the  harbor  just  out  of  range  of  the  fort,  and  began  to  take 
seals  from  the  rocks.  The  commandante  came  down  the 
beach,  and  with  much  gesticulation  (and  nothing  more 
effective)  ordered  him  away.  Greene  might  have  defied 
him,  but  instead  of  doing  so  sent  the  purser  to  offer  him  the 
shallop  (which  was  no  longer  needed)  for  permission  in 
writing  to  go  on  with  the  hunt.  The  offer  was  gladly 
accepted,  and  Greene  cleaned  the  coast  of  seals. 

Greene's  way  of  dealing  with  the  official  is  especially  in- 


212     THE   STORY  OF  THE   MERCHANT  MARINE 

teresting  because  it  was  characteristic  of  the  American  sea 
captains  of  the  day  in  their  intercourse  with  bumptious 
officials  everywhere. 

Then  the  Neptune  went  to  Juan  Fernandez  and  Mas-a- 
Fuera,  where  the  cargo  was  completed. 

"During  the  latter  part  of  the  time  ...  we  fre- 
quently stove  our  boats  in  the  surf,"  says  a  letter  written 
by  Purser  Eben  Townsend,  and  that  is  the  extent  of  his 
comment  on  the  dangers  of  landing  on  outlying  rocks  in 
the  midst  of  a  gale. 

On  June  9,  1798,  the  Neptune  sailed  for  Canton,  where 
she  sold  her  skins  for  $2  each,  and  used  the  proceeds  in 
buying  China  goods.  This  cargo,  on  reaching  New  York, 
paid  customs  duties  amounting  to  $55,438.71,  and  sold  for 
$260,000.  The  foremast  hands  received  a  "lay"  of  $1200 
each.  A  paragraph  in  one  of  Purser  Townsend's  letters 
regarding  these  foremast  hands  is  worth  quoting :  — 

"Many  of  our  crew  were  very  smart,  ambitious  young 
men.  ...  In  our  voyage  across  the  Pacific  they  exerted 
themselves  to  be  qualified  for  commanding  ships,  and 
the  captain  gave  them  as  much  indulgence  as  he  could 
for  that  object,  allowing  them  time  and  giving  them  in- 
struction. It  was  quite  a  regular  good  school  on  board, 
and  the  progress  was  even  greater  than  in  some  literary 
institutions  on  shore.  Some  men  that  could  not  do  a  sum 
in  addition  when  we  left  America  could  now  work  lunar 
observations." 

By  1825  the  seals  were  so  nearly  exterminated  that  the 


THE  HARVEST  OF  THE   SEA  213 

hunt  for  skins  gave  no  profit,  but  the  amount  of  sea-lion 
oil  that  could  be  secured  was  sufficient  to  keep  a  fleet  cruis- 
ing in  southern  seas  until  1870,  when  three  vessels  fitted 
once  more  for  a  skin  hunt  and  secured  8000.  The  next 
year  eight  vessels  obtained  15,000  good  fur  seals,  and  in 
1876  Captain  Athearn,  in  the  schooner  Florence,  took  a 
cargo  that  sold  for  $100,000.  Between  1871  and  1880  the 
number  of  skins  taken  was  92,756,  After  that  date  the 
hunt  again  became  unprofitable,  but  the  sea-lion  oil  kept  a 
few  vessels  busy  for  some  years.  The  year  1880  may  be 
called  the  last  of  the  employment  of  the  American  seal- 
hunting  fleet. 


CHAPTER  XII 

THE   PACKET   LINES   AND   THE   CLIPPERS 

TWO  results  of  the  War  of  1812  are  of  especial 
interest  here.  Through  good  fighting  the  Amer- 
ican ship  was  at  last  free  to  sail  upon  the  high 
seas  unmolested  by  any  power  upon  earth,  and  the  seafar- 
ing people  had  become  aggressive  to  a  degree  that  was 
little  short  of  bumptious.  In  the  weary  years  that  had 
passed  since  the  Trial  sailed  from  Boston,  our  sailors  had 
been  engaged  in  a  struggle  for  mere  existence ;  now  they 
were  to  enter  with  eager  zest  into  a  contest  for  the  suprem- 
acy of  the  seas. 

The  first  work  done  to  this  end  was  the  establishment  of 
a  packet  line  (1816)  from  New  York  to  Liverpool,  by 
Jeremiah  Thompson,  Isaac  Wright,  Benjamin  Marshal, 
and  other  capitalists  of  New  York  under  the  name  of  the 
Black  Ball  Line.  It  may  interest  students  of  psychology 
to  know  that  the  Quaker  religious  element  prevailed  among 
the  stockholders. 

The  word  '*  packet "  had  been  used  theretofore  at  sea 
only  in  connection  with  certain  small  but  swift  vessels 
(usually  brigs)  that  the  British  government  employed  to 
carry  the  mail  to  foreign  countries.     These  vessels  sailed 

214 


THE   PACKET  LINES   AND   THE   CLIPPERS      215 

from  the  home  port  at  regular  intervals,  and  the  weather 
was  bad  indeed  when  one  of  them  failed  to  get  away  at  the 
advertised  hour. 

In  connection  with  the  Liverpool  packet  service  it  is 
important  to  recall  the  difference  between  loading  a  ship 
"on  owners'  account,"  and  carrying  freight  for  any  shipper 
at  a  rate  per  ton.  The  earliest  American  ships  usually 
carried  cargo  that  belonged  to  the  owners  and  crews.  The 
ships  of  Derby's  time  carried  goods  partly  for  the  owners 
and  partly  for  "adventurers,"  who  paid  the  owners  a 
freight  rate.  With  the  further  growth  of  commerce  the 
amount  of  freight  offered  for  transportation  by  merchants 
who  owned  no  ships  had  increased  rapidly,  and  before,  as 
well  as  after,  the  War  of  181 2  there  were  ship-owners  who 
made  increasing  profits  by  catering  to  these  merchants. 
The  owners  of  these  vessels,  it  appears,  had  observed  that 
the  regularity  of  the  Hudson  River  packets  had  increased 
the  freight  and  passenger  traffic  there  in  a  far  greater  ratio 
than  any  one  would  have  anticipated  from  the  growth  of 
population;  and  this  fact  led  to  the  conclusion  that  if  a 
regular  day  of  despatch,  with  the  utmost  speed,  were  pro- 
vided for  the  New  York-Liverpool  trade  (the  trade  in 
which  the  freighting  traffic  was  largest),  the  ships  would 
be  able  to  command  the  best  part  of  the  commerce.  The 
event  justified  the  venture ;  the  Black  Ball  Line  was  profit- 
able from  first  departure.  The  ships  were  even  able  to 
command  higher  rates  than  the  ordinary  vessels. 

The  ships  employed  were  among  the  largest  and  swiftest 


2i6    THE   STORY  OF   THE   MERCHANT  MARINE 

of  the  period  (400  to  500  tons  each),  and  the  captains  were 
under  orders  to  drive  them  to  the  limit.  The  passages 
from  Sandy  Hook  to  Liverpool  during  the  first  9  years 
were  made  on  the  average  in  23  days,  the  shortest  time 
being  15  days  and  18  hours  —  made  by  the  New  York 
in  1822.  The  westward  passage  during  that  time  was 
made  in  40  days  on  the  average. 

In  1 82 1  the  Red  Star  Line  (Byrnes,  Grimble,  &  Co.) 
entered  the  Liverpool  service  with  a  ship  every  month  on 
the  24th  —  a  week  ahead  of  the  Black  Ball  Line.  To  meet 
this  competition  the  Black  Ball  began  sending  ships  away 
on  the  1 6th  as  well  as  the  first,  and  then  the  Swallow 
Tail  Line  (Thaddeus  Phelps  &  Co.,  and  Fish,  Grinnell, 
&  Co.)  made  the  service  weekly. 

In  182 1  Thomas  Cope  &  Son  began  a  monthly  service 
from  Philadelphia  to  Liverpool,  and  in  1823  the  Swallow 
Tail  Line  began  sending  ships  monthly  to  London.  This 
last  service  soon  had  opposition  in  a  line  established  by 
John  Griswold.  Then  between  1822  and  1832  three  lines 
were  successfully  established  between  New  York  and 
Havre. 

The  success  of  the  transatlantic  lines  led  to  the  forma- 
tion of  coastwise  lines.  A  number  of  180- ton  sloops 
made  regular  passages  from  New  York  to  Boston,  begin- 
ning in  1818.  In  1825  packets  began  running  from  New 
York  to  Charleston;  the  New  Orleans  line  was  opened 
in  1832,  and  at  the  same  time  another  line  began  running 
to  Vera  Cruz,  Mexico.     These  lines  added  much  to  the 


THE   PACKET  LINES  AND   THE   CLIPPERS      217 

offerings  of  freight  and  passengers  to  the  transatlantic  lines, 
and  helped  the  growth  of  New  York  immensely. 

The  New  Orleans  and  the  Vera  Cruz  lines  were  owned 
by  E.  K.  Collins,  a  man  of  much  importance  in  the  history 
of  the  American  merchant  marine,  as  shall  appear.  His 
success  in  these  two  lines  led  him  to  sail  into  the  Liverpool 
trade  with  what  was  known  as  the  Dramatic  Line.  The 
New  York  Daily  Advertiser,  in  announcing  this  line 
(September,  1836),  said:  — 

"We  notice  this  new  enterprise  with  pleasure,  as  it  will 
add  another  list  of  fine  ships  to  the  sixteen  now  built. 
The  ships  are  all  to  be  800  tons  and  upward,  New  York 
built.  The  Liverpool  lines  are  composed  of  20  ships  or 
about  14,000  tons.  .  .  .  Nor  will  the  establishment  of 
another  line  injure  in  the  slightest  degree  the  other  lines 
—  the  more  facilities  there  are  afforded  the  more  goods 
and  passengers  will  be  transported." 

The  number  of  ships  in  the  packet  fleets,  as  here  noted, 
is  worth  consideration,  for  if  the  ships  of  the  lines  to  Lon- 
don and  to  Havre  and  that  from  Philadelphia  be  added, 
the  whole  number  was  no  more  than  50,  the  tonnage  of 
which  was  less  than  35,000.  In  that  year  the  American 
tonnage  in  the  foreign  traffic  was  753,094.  The  packet 
fleets  contained  but  a  small  fraction  of  the  American 
tonnage,  but  their  influence  upon  the  contest  for  supremacy 
of  the  seas  was  wonderful. 

The  files  of  the  newspapers  of  the  day  give  many  glimpses 
of  the  packet  ships  as  the  reporters  saw  them.     Thus  the 


2i8     THE   STORY   OF   THE   MERCHANT  MARINE 

Liverpool  Courier,  of  March  24,  1824,  in  describing  the 
500-ton  Pacific,  Captain  S.  Maxwell,  said :  — 

"This  fine  vessel  has,  during  the  week,  been  crowded 
with  visitors  who  have  viewed  with  feelings  of  admira- 
tion the  splendid  style  in  which  her  cabins  are  fitted  up. 
Her  dining  room  is  40  feet  by  14.  A  mahogany  table 
runs  down  the  centre,  with  seats  on  each  side  formed  of 
the  same  wood  and  covered  with  black  hair  cloth.  The 
end  of  the  dining  room  aft  is  spanned  by  an  eliptical  arch, 
supported  by  handsome  pillars  of  Egyptian  porphyry. 
The  sides  of  the  cabin  are  formed  of  mahogany  and  satin 
wood,  tastefully  disposed  in  pannels  and  most  superbly 
polished.  The  doors  of  the  staterooms  are  very  neat,  the 
compartments  in  each  being  inlaid  with  a  square  of  plate 
glass.  An  arch  extends  over  the  entrance  to  each  room, 
supported  by  delicate  pillars  of  beautiful  white  Italian 
marble,  exquisitely  polished.  The  staterooms  are  seven 
on  each  side;  they  are  fitted  up  with  much  taste,  and  with 
a  studious  regard  of  the  comfort  and  convenience  of  the 
passengers.  The  sideboard  is  placed  in  a  recess  in  the  end 
of  the  cabin.  An  arch  is  thrown  over  it  by  two  pillars  of 
American  marble  from  the  state  of  Vermont.  .  .  .  The 
Pacific  is  built  of  live  oak,  copper  fastened,  and  is  now 
coppering  in  No.  2  Graving-Dock.  Nothing  can  exceed 
the  politeness  of  Captain  Maxwell  in  showing  her  to  the 
public." 

In  1838  the  New  York  Express,  in  describing  "the  last 
new  packet,"  said :  — 


THE   PACKET  LINES   AND   THE   CLIPPERS      219 

"  We  recollect  that  thirty  years  ago,  when  the  Manhattan 
was  launched  —  she  was  about  600  tons  burden  —  all 
New  York  crowded  down  to  see  her.  She  was  the  wonder 
of  the  day;  and  it  was  then  believed  that  she  was  the 
ne  plus  ultra  in  ship  building;  that  she  was  not  only  the 
largest  and  finest  ever  built,  but  that  ever  could  be  built. 
From  that  day  to  this  they  have  gone  on  improving  and 
building  until  they  have  now  got  to  a  point  of  perfection 
that  one  would  hardly  suppose  could  be  excelled.  Our 
ships,  and  particularly  our  packets,  are  admired  by  all 
nations  wherever  they  go;  and  although  we  do  not  admit 
that  we  cannot,  by  our  skill,  ingenuity  and  capital,  go  on 
improving,  the  world  admits  that  America  is  without  a 
rival  in  the  noble  art  of  building  this  description  of  vessel. 

"We  have,  from  time  to  time,  given  descriptions  of  the 
various  ships  that  have  been  put  afloat.  .  .  .  We  have 
now  another  to  add  —  the  ship  Roscius,  built  by  E.  K. 
Collins,  belonging  to  the  Dramatic  Line,  and  to  be  com- 
manded by  Captain  John  Collins.  She  is  the  largest  that 
has  yet  been  built,  and  for  strength  and  beauty  is  a  noble 
specimen  of  American  ship  building.  The  following 
are   her   dimensions:  — 

"Burden,  iioo  tons;  length  of  main  deck,  170  feet; 
length  of  spar  deck,  180  feet;  breadth  of  beam,  36^  feet; 
depth  of  hold,  22  feet ;  height  of  cabin,  6|  feet ;  height  from 
keelson  to  main  truck,  187  feet;  length ofmain yard,  75 feet." 

Of  the  velvet  used  upon  the  sofas,  and  the  Wilton  carpets, 
the   "scarlet  marino"   drapery,   "with   white  curtains," 


220    THE  STORY  OF   THE   MERCHANT  MARINE 

nothing  more  need  be  said,  but  the  facts  that  she  cost 
$100,000  ($go  per  ton)  and  would  "stow  about  3200  bales 
of  cotton"  are,  perhaps,  memorable. 

With  a  little  imagination  a  picture  that  warms  the  blood 
is  found  in  the  following  brief  paragraph  from  a  Liverpool 
paper  published  in  July,  1836:  — 

^^ Ship  Race. — Twelve  ships  sailed  from  New  York 
for  Liverpool  on  the  8th  instant.  Among  them  were 
the  packet  ships  Sheffield,  Allen;  the  Columbus,  Palmer; 
and  the  George  Washington,  H.  Holdredge,  and  several 
first-rate  vessels,  the  Star,  the  Congress,  the  Josephine,  &c. 
Heavy  bets  were  laid  on  the  respective  ships  at  the  time  of 
sailing.  The  three  packet  ships  having  parted  company, 
fell  in  with  each  other  on  the  Banks  of  Newfoundland. 
Here  they  parted.  The  George  Washington  passed 
Holyhead  on  Saturday  forenoon ;  two  or  three  hours  after- 
wards the  Sheffield  passed  the  same  place.  Both  ships 
entered  the  Mersey  in  the  course  of  the  afternoon,  after  a 
run  of  seventeen  days  from  port  to  port.  The  Columbus 
arrived  yesterday  morning.  None  of  the  other  ships  have 
yet  appeared." 

Fancy  a  newspaper  giving  no  more  space  than  that  to 
such  a  magnificent  race !  Still,  races  of  the  kind  were 
common  in  those  days,  and  the  sailor  can  imagine  how  the 
ships  were  handled.  The  Palmer  who  commanded  the 
Columbus,  by  the  way,  was  Nathaniel  Brown  Palmer,  who 
discovered  the  Antarctic  Continent  while  in  command  of 
the  Hero  —  "a  little  rising  forty  tons." 


THE   PACKET  LINES  AND   THE   CLIPPERS      221 

In  1837  the  papers  announced  that  the  Sheffield,  Cap- 
tain Allen,  that  came  in  second  in  the  race  had,  within 
the  past  12  months,  made  the  eastward  passage  five 
times  in  succession  in  an  aggregate  of  91  days,  "being 
an  average  of  about  18  days  each  from  port  to  port." 
In  her  next  passage  out  she  crossed  in  16  days,  thus 
creating  a  record  of  six  passages  in  103  days,  "being  a 
little  over  17  days  each." 

On  April  24,  1836,  the  Liverpool  Albion,  under  the 
heading  "Unprecedented  Quick  Passage,"  told  how  the 
Independence,  Captain  E.  Nye,  had  "  sailed  from  New  York 
on  the  evening  of  the  8th  instant,  and  the  interval  between 
her  leaving  and  taking  the  Liverpool  pilot  was  only 
fourteen  days  and  five  hours." 

"The  passage  from  port  to  port  has  frequently  been 
made  in  sixteen  days;  in  the  year  1822  the  packet  ship 
New  York  made  it  in  fifteen  days  and  three-quarters; 
but  the  Independence  is  the  only  ship  that  ever  accom- 
plished it  within  the  fifteen  days." 

The  passengers  on  the  Independence,  "being  desirous 
of  commemorating  the  unparalleled  short  passage,"  ap- 
pointed a  committee  to  "procure  and  convey"  to  Captain 
Nye  "a  Piece  of  Plate  with  a  suitable  inscription." 

The  Independence  measured  only  734  tons.  She  was 
built  in  New  York  in  1834. 

In  the  course  of  the  packet  period  five  other  liners  made 
passages  to  Liverpool  in  fourteen  days  or  less  —  the 
Montezuma,  the  Patrick  Henry,  the  Southampton,  the  St. 


222     THE   STORY   OF   THE  MERCHANT  MARINE 

Andrew,  and  the  Dreadnought.  Under  Captain  Samuel 
Samuels  the  Dreadnought  was  the  most  famous  of  them 
all.  She  ran  in  the  St.  George's  line  —  A.  Taylor  &  Co. 
Samuels  was  born  in  Philadelphia,  on  March  14,  1823. 
He  ran  away  to  sea  when  eleven  years  old,  and  at  twenty- 
one,  after  a  venturesome  career,  was  placed  in  command 
of  a  ship  called  the  Angelique.  In  1853  ^^^  Dreadnought 
(1413  tons)  was  built  especially  for  him,  and  as  he  told 
the  writer  she  was  a  ship  of  "medium  full  lines."  And 
yet  in  her  first  voyage  to  Liverpool  and  back^  she  reached 
Sandy  Hook  just  as  the  Cunard  steamer  Canada,  which 
had  left  Liverpool  one  day  ahead  of  her,  was  arriving  at 
Boston. 

On  Saturday,  February  9,  1856,  the  Liverpool  Chronicle, 
under  the  head  lines  "Important  from  America.  Five 
days  later  —  Arrival  of  the  Dreadnought,"  said :  — 

"The  clipper  Dreadnought,  Captain  Samuels,  .  .  . 
arrived  here  this  forenoon  from  New  York  after  a  rapid 
passage  of  fourteen  days  and  eight  hours." 

It  took  three  years  to  beat  that  passage,  but  in  1859 
Samuels  drove  her  from  Sandy  Hook  to  Rock  Light, 
Liverpool,  3000  miles,  in  13  days  and  8  hours.     And  in 

*  To  show  what  the  packets  carried,  here  is  the  invoice  of  the  Dread- 
nought's first  cargo  :  3S27  barrels  of  flour,  24,150  bushels  of  wheat, 
12,750  bushels  of  corn,  304  bales  of  cotton,  198  barrels  of  potash,  150 
boxes  of  bacon,  5600  staves,  60  tons  of  ballast,  a  total  dead  weight  of 
1559-65  tons. 

The  ship  was  200  feet  long  on  deck,  40.25  feet  wide,  26  feet  deep.  With 
this  cargo  on  board  she  drew  21 J  feet  of  water  aft  and  21  forward.  Her 
main  yard  was  79  feet  long. 


Captain  Samuel  Samuels 
By  courtesy  of  Harpurs  Magazine 


THE   PACKET  LINES   AND   THE   CLIPPERS      223 

i860  he  ran  from  Sandy  Hook  to  Queenstown,  a  distance 
of  2760  miles,  in  9  days  and  17  hours,  a  record  never 
equalled  either  before  or  since. 

"She  was  on  the  rim  of  a  cyclone,  most  of  the  time," 
said  the  captain  in  describing  the  passage  to  the  writer. 
The  sailors  of  the  day  called  her  the  "Wild  Boat  of  the 
Atlantic,"  and  some  unremembered  forecastle  bard  wrote  a 
song  of  nine  stanzas  about  her,  of  which  the  first  was :  — 

"  It  is  of  a  flash  packet, 

A  packet  of  fame. 
She  is  bound  to  New  York 

And  the  Dreadnought's  her  name. 
She  is  bound  to  the  west'ard 

Where  the  stormy  winds  blow. 
Bound  away  in  the  Dreadnought, 

To  the  west'ard  we'll  go." 

Seafaring  people  are  yet  alive  who  well  remember  the 
boisterous  vigor  with  which  the  old-time  sailors  used  to  roar 
out  "Bound  away  in  the  Dreadnought,  To  the  west'ard 
we'll  go,"  wherein  all  the  crew  joined  the  chanty  man. 

The  counting-house  view  of  the  packets  must  not  be 
overlooked.  The  earliest  ships  cost  about  $40,000,  or 
say  $80  a  ton  measurement.  The  later  ones  cost  nearer 
$90  a  ton,  the  Roscius,  of  iioo  tons,  as  noted  above,  cost- 
ing $100,000.  The  captain  usually  owned  an  eighth  of  his 
ship,  and  many  a  man  of  good  reputation  who  lacked  the 
money  to  buy  such  a  share  was  allowed  to  buy  in  with  a 
note  that  was  paid  off  with  his  share  of  the  earnings. 


224     THE   STORY   OF   THE   MERCHANT  MARINE 

The  captain,  who  was  part  owner,  naturally  handled  the 
ship  with  greater  economy  on  that  account.  The  salary 
of  the  captain  was  usually  $360  a  year,  but  in  addition 
he  had  5  per  cent  of  the  freight  money,  a  fourth  of  the 
cabin  passage  money,  all  the  money  paid  for  carrying 
mails  (twopence  a  letter  from  the  British  government, 
and  two  cents  from  the  American),  and  the  privilege  of 
carrying  his  wife  board  free.  On  the  whole,  these  captains 
made  not  far  from  $5000  a  year. 

The  number  of  cabin  passengers  varied  from  30  in  the 
earlier  days  up  to  80  in  the  later,  though  there  were  many 
passages,  of  course,  when  the  cabin  was  nearly  empty. 
The  price  of  passage  was  $140  during  most  of  the  time, 
but  competition  cut  it  to  $100,  now  and  then.  The  owners, 
however,  calculated  on  an  income  of  from  $2000  to  $5000 
per  passage  from  the  cabin.  The  income  from  freights 
ran  from  $5000  to  $10,000  per  passage.  Each  ship  made 
six  passages  a  year.  Much  larger  sums  were  earned  in 
a  single  passage  at  times.  The  Orient,  Captain  George 
S.  Hill,  once  made  a  gross  income  of  $50,000  for  a  round 
voyage,  while  the  Webster,  Captain  Joseph  J.  Law,  made 
$60,000. 

The  proudest  seafaring  man  in  the  world  at  that  period 
was  the  master  of  a  Liverpool  packet.  When  the  wind 
served  at  the  hour  of  sailing,  he  set  all  plain  sail  on  his 
vessel  as  she  lay  at  her  pier,  laid  all  flat  aback,  drove  her 
stern  first  into  the  stream,  turned  her  around,  and  then, 
while  the  spectators  cheered  themselves  hoarse,  he  sent 


THE  PACKET  LINES  AND   THE  CLIPPERS      225 

her  rippling  down  to  the  sea.  And  when  he  returned  he 
sometimes  arrived  in  the  river  with  royals  set  and  sailed 
her  into  her  berth  with  less  fuss  and  jar  than  the  ferry- 
boat in  the  near-by  slip  was  making.  Indeed,  tugs  were 
used  before  1835  only  when  the  wind  was  foul  or  wholly 
lacking,  and  for  years  after  that  it  was  a  matter  of  pride 
as  well  as  profit  to  save  the  tug  bill  ($140)  whenever 
possible. 

Most  of  the  newspapers  that  have  been  quoted  in  this 
chapter  were  printed  in  England.  It  is  a  significant 
fact  that  the  English  papers,  which  represented  the  atti- 
tude of  the  English  merchants  of  the  day,  gave  the  Ameri- 
can packets  unstinted  praise.  The  acrid  jealousy  that 
English  merchants  had  shown  during  all  the  long  years 
before  the  War  of  181 2  was  silenced.  How  did  it  happen 
that  these  "Yankee"  seamen  were  treated  so  well? 

The  British  House  of  Commons  having  appointed  a 
committee  in  1835  "to  inquire  into  the  cause  of  shipwrecks 
in  the  British  merchant  service,"  the  London  Courier, 
on  August  18  and  20,  1836,  printed  a  number  of  extracts 
from  the  committee's  report.  One  of  the  paragraphs  in 
that  report  is  of  special  interest :  — 

"  45.  American  Shipping.  — That  the  committee  cannot 
conclude  its  labor  without  calling  attention  to  the  fact, 
that  the  ships  of  the  United  States  of  America,  frequenting 
the  ports  of  England,  are  stated  by  several  witnesses  to 
be  superior  to  those  of  a  similar  class  amongst  the  ships  of 
Great  Britain,  the  commanders  and  officers  being  generally 

Q 


226    THE   STORY   OF   THE   MERCHANT  MARINE 

considered  to  he  more  competent  as  seamen  and  navigators, 
and  more  uniformly  persons  of  education,  than  the  com- 
manders and  officers  of  British  ships  of  a  similar  size  and 
class,  trading  from  England  to  America;  while  the  sea- 
men of  the  United  States  are  considered  to  be  more  care- 
fully selected  and  more  efficient;  that  American  ships 
sailing  from  Liverpool  to  New  York,  have  preference 
over  English  vessels  sailing  to  the  same  port,  both  as  to 
freight  and  to  rate  of  insurance;  and  higher  wages  being 
given,  their  whole  equipment  is  maintained  in  a  higher 
state  of  perfection,  so  that  fewer  losses  occur;  and  as  the 
American  shipping  have  increased  of  late  years  in  the 
proportion  of  i2|  per  cent  per  annum  while  the  British 
shipping  have  increased  within  the  same  period  i^  per 
cent  per  annum,"  the  superior  growth  of  the  American 
merchant  marine,  as  well  as  the  higher  wages  paid,  was 
taking  the  best  of  the  British  sailors  into  the  service  of  the 
American  ships. 

All  of  this  is  to  say  that  while  only  twenty-one  years 
had  elapsed  since  the  American  sailor  had  won,  by  good 
fighting,  the  right  to  cross  the  seas  unmolested  by  foreign 
war-ships,  his  chief  competitors  openly  acknowledged 
that  in  the  trade  between  New  York  and  Liverpool  (the 
most  important  trade  route  in  the  world)  he. had  won 
unquestioned  and  even  uncontested  supremacy.  The 
American  packets  received  cordial  praise  in  Liverpool 
because  no  British  ship-owner  so  much  as  thought  about 
entering  into  competition  with  them,  and  this,  too,  at  a 


THE   PACKET  LINES   AND   THE   CLIPPERS      227 

time  when  the  British  tonnage,  in  the  aggregate,  was 
far  greater  than  that  of  the  United  States. 

In  the  meantime  the  American  whalemen  had  won  su- 
premacy, as  already  noted,  in  the  work  of  gathering  the 
harvest  of  the  deep  seas,  and  the  most  splendid  conquest 
of  all,  the  supremacy  of  the  sea  in  the  trade  of  the  Far  East, 
was  at  hand. 

The  most  interesting  feature  of  this  contest  was  the 
evolution  of  a  class  of  ships  called  clippers.  Curiously 
enough,  it  appears  that  one  aggressive  naval  architect, 
John  W.  Griffiths,  of  New  York,  was  responsible  for  the 
introduction  of  this  remarkable  type  of  ships.  Griffiths 
was  of  the  opinion  that  a  ship  having  "hollow"  or  concave 
water-lines,  especially  at  the  bow,  —  "hollow  entrance 
lines," — would  sail  more  swiftly  than  one  with  ordinary 
convex  lines,  no  matter  how  fine  the  convex  lines  might 
be.  In  1841  Griffiths  exhibited  a  model  of  a  ship  shaped 
according  to  his  ideas,  at  the  American  Institute,  and  he 
also  delivered  a  number  of  lectures  on  the  subject.  The 
nautical  world  became  greatly  interested,  and  in  1843 
William  H.  Aspinwall  ordered  a  ship  of  750  tons  built 
to  designs  by  Griffiths.  She  was  named  the  Rainbow, 
and  when  sent,  under  Captain  John  Land,  to  Canton  on 
her  maiden  voyage,  she  arrived  back  at  the  end  of  6 
months  and  14  days.  In  another  voyage  she  sailed  to  Can- 
ton in  92  days  and  made  the  passage  home  in  88,  breaking 
the  record  each  way. 

The  Howqua,  the  Samuel  Russell,  and  the  Sea  Witch 


228     THE   STORY   OF   THE  MERCHANT  MARINE 

were  also  built  to  the  new  designs,  —  the  clipper  model, 
as  it  soon  came  to  be  called, — and  all  made  swift  passages. 
The  Russell  is  of  special  interest  because  she  was  com- 
manded by  Captain  N.  B.  Palmer,  who  now  left  the  packet 
service  to  engage  in  that  of  the  Far  East.  His  first  run  was 
made  to  Hongkong  in  114  days,  which  was  slow  time  for 
a  racer,  but  in  the  course  of  the  voyage  he  covered  318 
miles  in  a  day;  and  in  30  consecutive  days  he  sailed 
6722  miles.  To  complete  Palmer's  record  it  may  be  said 
here  that  in  his  last  ship,  the  Orient,  he  covered  328  sea 
miles  in  a  day,  and  made  the  run  home  from  Canton  in 
81  days. 

The  Howqua's  best  work  was  the  run  from  Shanghai 
to  New  York  in  88  days.  The  Water  Witch,  called  "the 
swiftest  ship  of  her  day,"  was  commanded  by  Captain 
Robert  H.  Waterman  ("Captain  Bob").  She  set  the 
pace  when  she  sailed  from  New  York  on  December  23, 
1846.  In  25  days  she  hove  to  off  Rio  Janeiro  long  enough 
to  send  mail  ashore  on  an  inbound  ship,  and  in  104  days 
she  reached  Hongkong.  Her  return  run  from  Canton  was 
made  in  81  days.  In  the  next  voyage  she  returned  from 
Canton  in  77  days,  her  best  day's  run  being  358  sea  miles, 
something  then  unheard  of. 

There  were  a  number  of  other  celebrated  clippers  in 
the  China  trade,  but  none  of  them  was  swifter  than  the 
Shooting  Star,  with  a  passage  record  of  88  days  from 
Canton,  and  the  Atlanta  with  a  record  of  84;  none 
equalled  Waterman's  passage  of  77  days. 


THE   PACKET  LINES   AND   THE   CLIPPERS      229 

When  the  captains  of  these  clippers,  dressed  in  "lustrous, 
straw-colored,  raw-silk  suits,"  paraded  the  water  front 
of  New  York,  they  were  more  admired  and  envied  by 
the  loungers  than  any  prince  or  potentate  on  earth.  They 
were  the  kings  of  the  sea  by  right  of  conquest.  Imagine 
what  Captain  Waterman  would  have  done  if  told  that 
he  reigned  by  grace  of  "a  system  of  national  protection 
deliberately  initiated  in  1789!" 

In  1849  the  British  government,  in  a  desperate  deter- 
mination to  place  British  shipping  ahead  of  American 
in  quality  as  well  as  quantity,  repealed  the  old  navigation 
laws.  British  merchants  were  not  only  permitted  to  buy 
American  ships,  but  American  ships  were  permitted  to 
enter  all  trades  to  the  United  Kingdom.  The  British 
ship-builders  declared  their  business  would  be  ruined; 
and  the  building  of  the  old-style  wooden  ships  was  ruined. 
The  ship-owners,  too,  saw  disaster  staring  them  in  the 
face,  and,  for  a  time,  there  was  reason  for  their  fears.  For 
where  the  British  ships  in  the  tea  trade  received  from 
;i^3  to  £4  per  ton  (50  cubic  feet)  from  Canton  to  London, 
the  American  clippers  received  six  and  even  more. 

The  little  Baltimore  clipper  Architect,  having  made  a 
run  from  Canton  to  London  in  107  days,  beating  the  fleet 
by  about  a  week,  she  was  paid  ;,^8  a  ton  when  next  she 
applied  for  a  cargo  of  new-crop  teas.  The  ordinary  ships 
were  glad  to  get  the  common  £4. 

In  the  meantime  the  California  territory  was  acquired 
from   Mexico   by   the    treaty   proclaimed    July   4,    1848. 


230     THE   STORY   OF   THE   MERCHANT  MARINE 

Placer  gold-  had  already  been  discovered  in  El  Dorado 
county  (January  24),  and  when  official  reports  confirmed 
the  wide-spread  rumors  of  the  "find,"  a  migration  of  gold- 
seekers  such  as  the  world  had  never   seen  was  begun. 

The  growth  of  population  in  the  territory  was  phenomenal, 
and  the  growth  at  once  created  an  insistent  demand  for 
many  products  of  civilization,  especially  for  such  things 
as  were  needed  by  miners  and  town-builders ;  for  the  whole 
region  was  a  wilderness.  This  demand  was  backed  by 
gold  washed  from  the  placers,  and  the  prices  seem  now 
almost  beyond  belief. 

"On  the  ist  of  July,  1849,  lumber  was  selling  at  San 
Francisco  for  $500  per  1000  feet.  A  better  quality  of 
lumber  could  be  purchased  in  New  York  for  $12  —  in 
Maine  for  $10."  (Ex.  Doc.  2,  32  Cong,  i  sess.  p.  306.) 
At  the  same  time,  (Phil.  Quar.  Reg.,  Dec.  1849),  eggs  were 
selling  as  high  as  $2  a  dozen,  hens  for  $4  each,  butter  at 
$1.50  a  pound,  and  potatoes,  by  the  pound,  6  to  8  cents ; 
turnips  and  cabbages  still  higher. 

The  merchants  made  haste  to  forward  the  needed  sup- 
plies; thousands  of  eager  gold-hunters  sought  passage  on 
the  outbound  ships,  and  the  one  demand  of  the  merchant 
and  the  passenger  was  for  speed. 

The  number  of  ships  obtainable  being  inadequate,  the 
merchants  went  to  the  shipyards,  and  it  was  then  that  the 
most  famous  of  all  the  American  clippers  were  built.    ■ 

The  records  of  some  of  the  old  ships  that  were  at  once 
put  into  the  California  trade  were  not  bad.     The  Colonel 


THE   PACKET  LINES  AND   THE   CLIPPERS      231 

Fremont  reached  San  Francisco  after  a  passage  of  127 
days,  and  the  Grey  Eagle  in  117.  But  the  Flying  Cloud, 
built  by  Donald  McKay  of  Boston,  and  sailed  by  Captain 
Josiah  P.  Creesy,  of  Marblehead,  in  185 1,  made  the  passage 
in  89  days,  and  in  one  day  covered  374  sea  miles.  The 
length  of  this  passage  is  given  as  84  days  in  some  ac- 
counts, but  A  Description  of  the  New  Clipper  Great 
Republic,  a  pamphlet  printed  at  Eastburn's  Press,  Boston, 
in  1853,  for  Donald  McKay,  says  the  time  was  89  days. 
This  pamphlet  also  says  that  the  outlook  for  profits  led 
McKay  to  build  the  Sovereign  of  the  Seas,  a  ship  of  2400 
tons,  and  then  the  largest,  longest,  and  sharpest  merchant 
ship  in  the  world.  "  Contrary  to  the  advice  of  his  best 
friends,  he  built  her  on  his  own  account ;  he  embarked  all 
he  was  worth  in  her,  for  no  merchant  in  this  vicinity  would 
risk  capital  in  such  a  vessel,  as  she  was  considered  too  large 
and  costly  for  any  trade.  .  .  .  To  the  surprise  of  even 
those  who  knew  him  best,  he  played  the  merchant  and 
loaded  her  himself.  And  well  he  was  rewarded.  He 
not  only  sold  her  on  his  own  terms,  but  her  performances 
exceeded  his  expectations." 

Captain  Lachlan  McKay,  brother  of  Donald,  com- 
manded this  famous  clipper.  In  August,  185 1,  she  left 
New  York  for  San  Francisco,  and  until  well  beyond  the 
Horn  made  record  speed;  but  off  Valparaiso,  while  the 
captain  was  driving  her  through  a  gale  by  night,  an  extra 
heavy  squall  carried  away  her  fore  and  main  topmasts. 
Captain  McKay  was  sitting  in  an  arm-chair  on  the  quarter- 


232     THE   STORY   OF   THE   MERCHANT  MARINE 

deck  at  the  time,  and  that  chair  was  his  only  bed  for  the 
next  two  weeks.  During  that  time  new  masts  were  made 
and  got  on  end,  the  yards  were  crossed  and  sail  was  made. 
She  reached  San  Francisco  in  102  days  from  New  York 
in  spite  of  the  disaster. 

Going  to  Honolulu,  the  Sovereign  of  the  Seas  loaded  whale- 
oil  for  New  York.  In  the  course  of  the  passage  she  sailed 
3144  sea  miles  in  10  consecutive  days,  and  arrived  in  New 
York  in  82  days.  There  she  loaded  for  Liverpool,  sailed 
on  June  18,  1852,  and  anchored  in  the  Mersey  13  days 
and  19  hours  later.  During  this  passage  she  covered 
340  sea  miles  in  a  day.  Her  next  voyage  was  to  San 
Francisco,  and  during  the  return  passage,  "in  24  con- 
secutive hours  she  ran  430  geographical  miles."  (East- 
burn  pamphlet.) 

The  Antelope  and  the  Surprise  are  credited  with  making 
passages  from  San  Francisco  to  New  York  in  97  days; 
the  John  Gilpin  and  the  Sweepstakes  in  94 ;  the  Flying  Fish 
and  the  Great  Republic  in  92,  and  the  Sword  Fish  in  91. 
Professor  J.  Russell  Smith's  Ocean  Carrier  says  the  Comet 
made  the  passage  in  76  days.  Her  record  is  disputed  (see 
Shipping  Illustrated,  New  York,  April  3,  1909),  but  the 
Nautical  Magazine,  April,  1856,  confirms  it.  It  is  not 
disputed  that  the  Northern  Light  ran  from  San  Francisco 
to  Boston  in  76  days,  and  Captain  A.  H.  Clark,  in  Harper^ s 
Magazine,  June,  1908,  says  the  Trade  Wind  made  the 
San  Francisco-New  York  passage  in  the  same  number 
of  days. 


THE   PACKET  LINES   AND   THE   CLIPPERS      233 

The  Great  Republic,  built  by  Donald  McKay,  was  the 
largest  American  clipper  ship.  She  was  "325  feet  long, 
53  feet  wide  and  her  whole  depth  is  39  feet."  She  was  "of 
4000  tons  register  and  full  6000  tons  stowage  capacity." 
She  had  four  masts,  the  after,  or  spanker,  mast  carrying 
fore  and  aft  sails  only.  Her  main-yard  was  120  feet  long. 
After  she  was  loaded  at  New  York  for  her  maiden  voyage 
she  was  accidentally  burned,  the  total  loss,  as  insured, 
amounting  to  $400,000.  The  sunken  hull  was  raised, 
rebuilt  at  a  cost  of  $27,000  and  she  was  then  rigged 
as  before.  In  rebuilding  her,  a  less  depth  of  hull 
was  given,  but  she  was  still  able  to  carry  4000  tons  dead 
weight.  With  3000  tons  in  her  hold  she  ran  from  New 
York  to  the  coast  of  England  in  12  days.  In  the  Guano 
trade  from  the  west  coast  of  South  America  she  was  credited 
with  making  412  miles  in  one  day.  (Admiral  Preble  in 
U.S.  Serv.  Mag.,  July,  1889.)  The  Red  Jacket  once  cov- 
ered 413  sea  miles  in  a  day,  and  the  Flying  Scud  claimed 
a  day's  run  of  449,  but  this  was  disputed.  (See  Nautical 
Magazine,  June,  1855.)  The  undisputed  record  day's  run 
was  made  by  the  Lightning,  built  by  Donald  McKay,  for 
English  capitalists.  A  letter  from  McKay  which  appeared 
in  the  Scientific  American  on  November  26,  1859,  says:  — 

"  Although  I  designed  and  built  the  clipper  ship  Lightning, 
and  therefore  ought  to  be  the  last  to  praise  her,  yet  such  has 
been  her  performance  since  Englishmen  learned  to  sail  her, 
that  I  must  confess  I  feel  proud  of  her.  You  are  aware 
that  she  was  so  sharp  and  concave  forward  that  one  of  her 


234     THE   STORY   OF   THE   MERCHANT   MARINE 

stupid  captains,  who  did  not  comprehend  the  principle 
upon  which  she  was  built,  persuaded  the  owners  to  fill  in 
the  hollows  of  her  bows.  They  did  so,  and  according  to 
their  Bullish  bluff  notions,  she  was  not  only  better  for  the 
addition,  but  would  sail  faster,  and  wrote  me  to  that  effect. 
Well,  the  next  passage  to  Melbourne,  Australia,  she  washed 
the  encumbrance  away  on  one  side,  and  when  she  returned 
to  Liverpool,  the  other  side  was  also  cleared  away.  Since 
then  she  has  been  running  as  I  modelled  her.  As  a  speci- 
men of  her  speed  I  may  say  that  I  saw  recorded  in  her  log 
(of  24  hours)  436  nautical  miles,  a  trifle  over  18  knots  an 
hour." 

A  few  records  will  give  an  idea  of  the  profits  of  the  best 
of  the  clippers.  The  Sovereign  of  the  Seas  received  $84,000 
freight  money  for  the  passage  when  she  was  dismasted, 
and  her  owner  says  she  earned  $200,000  in  the  first  eleven 
months.  The  Surprise,  Captain  Dumaresque,  in  a  voyage 
from  New  York  to  San  Francisco  and  then  by  way  of  China 
home,  made  a  net  profit  of  $50,000  above  her  cost  and  all 
expenses.  The  Great  Republic,  according  to  Preble,  re- 
ceived $160,000  freight  in  a  passage  from  New  York  to 
San  Francisco.  It  seems  worth  noting  here  that  the  in- 
surance rates  on  these  hard-driven  clippers  were  far  lower 
than  can  now  be  obtained  by  the  best  of  modern  sailing 
ships. 

The  most  interesting  period  in  the  history  of  the  Ameri- 
can merchant  marine  is  the  clipper  ship  era.  The  story 
has  been  told  over  and  again,  but  the  interest  never  flags. 


THE   PACKET  LINES  AND   THE   CLIPPERS      235 

And  yet  while  those  ships  were  sweeping  the  seas  and  lying 
in  port  where  their  captains  walked  the  piers  in  suits  of 
lustrous  China  silks;  and  while  the  newspapers  of  Europe 
as  well  as  America  were  printing  in  leaded  lines  the  details 
of  their  wonderful  passages,  the  seafaring  people  of  the 
United  States  were  living  in  a  fooVs  paradise.  The  work 
that  was  to  drive  the  American  flag  from  the  principal 
trade  routes  of  the  seas  had  been  begun  before  the  keel  of 
the  clipper  Rainbow  was  stretched.  Our  seafaring  people 
saw  it,  too,  and  even  helped  it  on,  but  with  but  one  notable 
exception,  so  far  as  the  record  shows,  they  utterly  failed  to 
comprehend  its  significance. 

The  character  and  effect  of  that  work  shall  be  described 
in  another  chapter.  It  remains  to  consider  here  one 
other  interesting  fact  about  the  clippers.  It  is  demon- 
strable that  the  shapes  of  the  much-lauded  clipper  hulls 
had  only  a  trifling,  if  any,  influence  upon  the  speed  at- 
tained. Indeed  the  lines  upon  which  the  builders  of  the 
most  famous  of  them  all  relied  for  speed  were  inferior,  as 
modern  designers  know,  to  those  of  some  ordinary  ships 
wholly  unknown  to  the  record. 

As  a  first  bit  of  evidence  in  proof  of  this  assertion  here  is 
the  story  of  the  Natchez  in  which  Captain  "Bob"  Water- 
man first  won  fame.  In  1843  Waterman  sailed  her  around 
the  world  and  made  the  passage  from  Canton  to  New  York 
in  94  days.  The  whole  voyage  required  only  9  months 
and  26  days.  In  1844  he  drove  her  from  New  York  to 
Valparaiso  in  71  days,  thence  to  Callao  in  8,  and  thence  to 


236     THE   STORY   OF   THE   MERCHANT  MARINE 

Hongkong  in  54.  She  then  loaded  teas  at  Canton  and  he 
drove  her  from  that  port  to  New  York,  13,955  rniles,  in 
78  days.  This  last  passage  was  but  one  day  longer  than 
Waterman's  record  passage  of  77  days  made  in  the  Sea 
Witch,  "  the  swiftest  clipper  of  her  day."  But  the  Natchez 
was  not  a  clipper,  although  she  has  been  described  as  one. 
She  was  built  with  full  lines  and  a  flat  bottom  in  order  that 
she  might  carry  huge  loads  of  cotton  from  New  Orleans, 
across  the  shoals  at  the  mouths  of  the  Mississippi,  and 
around  to  New  York ;  and  while  engaged  in  that  trade,  she 
had  earned  the  reputation  of  being  one  of  the  slowest  ships 
on  the  American  coast ! 

As  to  the  lines  of  the  clippers  note  that  while  Donald 
McKay  supposed  that  the  Lightning  made  her  great  speed 
because  she  was  "hollow"  at  the  bow,  the  modern  yacht 
designers,  who  have  tried  out  the  hollow  lines  for  years, 
have  entirely  abandoned  them.  The  famous  America 
had  hollow  lines;  no  modern  yacht  has  anything  of  the 
kind. 

The  Dreadnought,  with  her  unequalled  North  Atlantic 
record,  was  called  a  "  semi-clipper,"  in  her  day.  Her  lines, 
as  printed  in  Griffiths's  Nautical  Magazine,  show  that  she 
was  as  full  as  many  ships  that  were  never  classed  as  any- 
thing but  plain  cargo  carriers.  In  connection  with  this 
fact  recall  the  records  of  a  ship  or  two  built  long  before 
the  clipper  era  —  Derby's  Mount  Vernon,  for  instance, 
with  her  passage  of  17  days  from  Salem  to  Gibral- 
tar.    The  Silas  Richards,  formerly  a  packet  between  New 


THE   PACKET  LINES   AND   THE   CLIPPERS      237 

York  and  Liverpool,  left  New  York  in  June,  1836,  for 
Canton,  and  she  was  back  in  New  York  at  the  end  of  March, 
1837.  Her  run  home  was  made  in  91  days.  Even  the  old 
Desire  (high  in  poop  and  low  in  spars,  when  compared 
with  the  clippers)  made  the  passage,  away  back  in  1640, 
from  Boston  to  Gravesend  in  23  days. 

Out  of  157  vessels  that  arrived  at  San  Francisco  in  1852, 
no  less  than  seventy  had  been  designed  as  clippers,  of 
which,  however,  only  three  or  four  made  notable  passages. 

No  complete  list  of  the  ships  built  with  clipper  lines  was 
ever  made,  nor  can  one  be  made  now ;  but  out  of  the  2656 
ships  and  barks  launched  between  1843  and  1855,  which 
was  the  clipper  era,  it  is  certain  that  at  least  10  per  cent  — 
256  —  were  of  the  clipper  model.  But  only  a  few  more 
than  a  score  ever  made  better  records  than  the  previously 
built  packets  had  made.  Indeed,  many  of  the  leanest  and 
sharpest  of  the  clipper  hulls,  together  with  (curiously 
enough)  others  that  were  built  from  the  drawings  of  some 
of  the  successful  clippers,  were  absolute  failures,  so  far  as 
speed  was  concerned. 

This  is  not  to  deny  that  the  clippers  were  in  some  respects 
grand  ships.  They  were  superior  in  the  strength  of  hull, 
in  the  breadth  of  beam,  and,  consequently,  in  the  spread  of 
canvas  under  which  they  could  stand.  In  the  general  propor- 
tions of  their  hulls  many  of  them  were  right  —  as  was  the 
old  frigate  Constitution,  which  had  a  bow  as  round  as  an 
apple  and  yet  had  a  record  of  better  than  12  knots  an 
hour.     But  even  when  all  of  that  is  said,  the  fact  remains 


238     THE   STORY   OF  THE   MERCHANT  MARINE 

that  the  full-lined  Natchez  was  but  a  day  behind  the  record 
from  Canton. 

If  it  was  not  to  the  model  of  the  ships,  to  what,  then, 
were  the  splendid  records  due?  The  answer  is  of  the 
utmost  importance  in  any  study  of  the  American  merchant 
marine.  The  records  were  due  to  the  fact  that  our  seamen 
were  the  most  ambitious  and  the  most  efficient  sailors  of 
the  sail  that  the  world  has  ever  seen.  While  the  gale  per- 
mitted the  ship  to  hold  her  course,  the  captain  paced  the 
deck  the  whole  night  long  and  caught  his  sleep  by  day  in 
short  naps  under  the  weather  rail  in  order  that  he  might  see 
that  she  was  kept  going.  The  sheets  and  halyards  of 
the  important  sails  on  those  record  ships  were  made  of 
chains,  and  they  were  locked  fast  in  place  —  held  by  pad- 
locks, so  that  frightened  sailors,  unseen  by  the  master, 
could  not  let  them  fly  when  the  ship,  rolling  to  the 
blast  at  night,  dragged  her  lee  rail  through  the  solid 
water.  When  the  captain  gave  an  order,  the  crew 
ran  with  all  their  might  to  do  the  work  —  or  they  were 
knocked  across  the  deck  with  a  pump-brake  in  the  hands 
of  the  nerve-racked  mate.  Captain  Waterman  even  shot 
men  off  the  yards  because  they  seemed  to  be  handling 
the  sails  slowly.  Studding  sails  were  spread  to  the  zephyrs 
when  the  ship  crossed  the  equator,  and  they  were  yet 
seen  in  place  while  she  sailed  with  trade-winds  so  strong 
that  ships  from  Europe  close-hauled  were  reefed  down 
to  the  cap.  Indeed,  all  sail  was  often  carried  when 
ordinary    ships    were    seen    reefed    down   on   the   same 


THE   PACKET  LINES   AND   THE   CLIPPERS      239 

course.  As  Clark  Russell  notes  in  one  of  his  novels, 
the  skipper  of  the  ship  from  Europe,  as  he  paced  the 
deck  with  anxious  eyes  upon  his  shortened  canvas,  fear- 
ing that  it  would  be  blown  from  the  bolt  ropes,  very 
often  saw  a  tiny  white  speck  upon  the  horizon,  watched  it 
grow  into  a  splendid  ship  with  "every  rag  set,"  saw  her 
fling  the  Stars  and  Stripes  to  the  gale,  as  she  went  roaring 
by,  and  then  with  feelings  that  cannot  be  described,  gazed 
after  her  until  she  disappeared  in  the  mists  far  down 
the  lee. 

If  the  two  crews  thus  meeting  in  mid-ocean  could 
have  changed  ships,  the  bluff-bowed  hulk  from  Europe 
would  soon  have  gone  smoking  away  while  the  clipper 
would  have  rolled  her  spars  over  the  lee  rail  before  her 
new  crew  could  have  learned  the  lead  of  a  single  sheet  or 
halyard. 

It  was  the  man  on  the  quarter-deck — he  who  had  han- 
dled ships  among  the  rocks  of  the  South  Shetlands,  or  had 
lanced  whales  in  the  North  Pacific,  or  had  skimmed  the 
sands  of  Cape  Hatteras,  in  order  to  learn  the  arts  of  the 
sea  as  handed  down  from  the  beginning  —  it  was  the  mas- 
ter mariner  evolved  by  two  hundred  years  of  battle — with 
the  sea  and  its  people  —  who  made  the  American  flag  su- 
preme upon  all  the  seas  of  the  whole  world. 


CHAPTER   XIII 

DEEP-WATER    STEAMSHIPS  —  PART  I 

IN  order  to  comprehend  the  story  of  the  eflforts  to 
establish  lines  of  steam  packets  under  the  American 
flag  between  the  United  States  and  various  ports  in 
Europe,  it  is  necessary  at  this  point  to  review  briefly  our 
foreign  relations  in  the  period  between  the  War  of  1812 
and  the  Civil  War,  and  then  to  consider  what  was  done  by 
the  British  in  the  early  development  of  steam  navigation. 

In  the  year  1818,  in  the  course  of  what  is  known  as  the 
Seminole  War,  General  Jackson,  at  the  head  of  a  strong 
body  of  troops,  invaded  the  Spanish  territory  of  Florida, 
captured  a  number  of  fortified  places,  and  ruthlessly 
hanged  one  British  subject  named  Arbuthnot  and  shot 
another  named  x'Vmbrister  on  the  unproved  charge  that  the 
two  had  been  "stirring  up  the  Indians  to  war  with  the 
United  States."  No  war  followed  this  outrage,  but  the  ill 
feeling  which  had  animated  the  British  after  the  War  of 
181 2  was  greatly  intensified. 

Trouble  over  the  northeast  boundary  of  the  United  States 
followed,  and  when  the  king  of  the  Netherlands  was  asked 
to  arbitrate  the  matter,  he  laid  down  a  line  which  was  not 

240 


DEEP-WATER  STEAMSHIPS  —  PART  I  241 

satisfactory  to  the  English.  At  the  same  time  it  was  exas- 
perating to  the  Americans,  especially  to  the  people  of 
Maine.  In  fact,  open  hostilities  in  a  small  way  occurred 
near  the  boundary. 

In  1837  the  British  manner  of  ruling  the  Canadian  region 
created  so  much  opposition  among  the  settlers  there  that  a 
small  insurrection  broke  out.  It  was  suppressed,  but  only 
to  break  out  again,  and  at  this  time  a  number  of  American 
sympathizers  joined  the  insurgents.  A  band  of  the  insur- 
gents having  taken  possession  of  Navy  Island,  in  the 
Niagara  River,  the  American  sympathizers  went  in  the 
American  steamer  Caroline  to  join  them,  and  carried  arms 
and  supplies.  The  steamer  then  returned  to  American 
waters,  but  the  British  loyalists  crossed  over  the  line,  cap- 
tured the  steamer,  set  her  on  fire,  and  sent  her  over  Niagara 
Falls.  One  American  was  killed  in  the  attack.  Later  a 
Canadian  deputy  sheriff  boasted  that  he  had  killed  the  man 
whose  life  was  taken,  and  then,  in  1840,  incautiously  came 
across  toLockport,  New  York,  where  he  was  arrested  for  the 
murder.  His  name  was  Alexander  McLeod.  Thereupon 
the  British  government,  with  the  aggressive  Palmerston  in 
the  lead,  avowed  that  the  CaroliiiewsiS,  seized  on  the  author- 
ity of  the  nation,  and  peremptorily  demanded  McLeod's 
release.  The  Washington  authorities  were  disposed  to 
yield,  but  Governor  Seward,  of  New  York,  declared  that 
McLeod  should  stand  trial;  and  he  did.  But  having 
proved  an  alibi,  he  was  acquitted,  and  on  October  12,  1841, 
he  was  returned  to  Canada.     In  the  meantime  an  Ameri- 


242     THE   STORY  OF   THE   MERCHANT  MARINE 

can  had  been  seized  as  a  hostage  to  abide  McLeod's  fate. 
He  was  of  course  released  at  last. 

In  the  course  of  the  year  1841  an  American  coaster 
named  the  Creole,  while  carrying  a  cargo  of  slaves  from  the 
breeding  grounds  in  Virginia  to  the  ever  eager  market  in 
the  Southwest,  was  taken  from  her  officers  and  crew  by  the 
slaves,  who  then  ran  the  vessels  to  the  Bahamas,  where  the 
slaves,  125  in  number,  were  protected.  The  slave  owners 
of  the  United  States  had  been  restive  because  of  frequent 
reports  that  British  cruisers,  engaged  in  suppressing  the 
slave  trade  upon  the  coast  of  Africa,  had  "exercised  the 
right  of  search  "  by  boarding  ships  under  the  American  flag, 
and  when  the  story  of  the  protection  of  the  Creole^s  cargo 
reached  the  country,  the  excitement  rose  toward  the  war 
heat. 

In  the  meantime,  the  United  States  had  annexed  Florida. 
Then  the  Texans  set  up  an  independent  government,  and 
it  was  recognized  as  an  independent  nation,  but  with  its 
people  openly  anxious  for  annexation  to  the  United  States. 
The  statesmen  of  England  saw  that  annexation  was  inevi- 
table and  that  a  war  with  ^Mexico  would  follow,  with  the  re- 
sult that  the  territory  of  the  United  States  would  be  enlarged 
in  the  Southwest  and  along  the  Spanish  Main,  where 
British  subjects  were  looking  for  a  further  extension  of  ter- 
ritory and  influence.  For  at  about  this  time  the  ancient 
settlement  of  logwood  cutters  at  Belize  was  developed  into 
the  colony  of  British  Honduras  (1845).  Although  Eng- 
land had  subscribed  to  and  helped  to  enforce  the  Monroe 


DEEP-WATER  STEAMSHIPS  —  PART  I  243 

Doctrine,  her  statesmen  were  looking  to  an  extension  of 
British  Honduras  as  far  south  as  the  mouth  of  the  Rio  San 
Juan,  in  Nicaragua.  To  secure  this  extension  a  protecto- 
rate over  the  Mosquito  Coast  Indians  was  declared,  and 
the  coast  was  assumed  to  be  territory  entirely  independent 
of  Nicaragua.  On  August  19,  1841,  British  war-ships  cap- 
tured San  Juan  del  Norte,  at  the  mouth  of  the  San  Juan, 
drove  away  the  Nicaragua  officials,  and  installed  Mos- 
quito Indians.  The  Nicaraguans  soon  drove  away  the 
Mosquito  forces,  but  the  interest  in  the  place  having  been 
intensified  by  projects  for  building  an  interoceanic  canal 
across  the  country,  the  British  returned,  late  in  1847,  and 
on  January  10,  1848,  placed  the  Mosquito  chiefs  once  more 
in  possession. 

With  the  rush  of  emigrants  to  California,  the  United 
States  became  interested  in  this  aggression.  It  would 
never  do  to  allow  the  British  to  control  such  a  highway 
as  was  then  in  contemplation.  The  British  naturally 
held  on  to  what  they  had  secured  at  the  mouth  of  the  San 
Juan,  however,  and  then,  with  a  view  of  obtaining  control 
of  the  other  end  of  the  canal  route  (the  Gulf  of  Fonseca), 
they  began  to  press  Honduras  for  the  payment  of  certain 
claims  of  British  subjects,  the  nature  of  which  is  of  no 
importance  because  the  claims  were  merely  a  pretext  for 
an  aggression  that  would  have  been  made  had  no  claims 
been  in  existence.  To  back  these  claims  a  British  war- 
ship appeared,  but  when  the  Honduranians  were  in  straits, 
the  American  envoy  to  Nicaragua  heard  of  their  trouble, 


244    THE  STORY  OF  THE   MERCHANT  MARINE 

hastened  to  meet  them,  and  then  negotiated  a  treaty 
(September  28, 1849)  by  which  a  part  of  Tigre  Island  and 
a  part  of  the  coast  of  the  Gulf  of  Fonseca  were  granted  to 
the  United  States  for  a  naval  station.  When  the  British 
envoy  learned  how  he  had  been  outwitted,  he  ordered  some 
of  the  naval  force  at  his  command  to  seize  Tigre  Island  in 
contempt  of  the  acquired  rights  of  the  United  States. 
(See  Keasbey's  Nicaragua  Canal  and  Pims  Panarna.) 
That  the  British  fully  expected  a  war  with  the  United 
States,  is  beyond  dispute.  In  fact,  they  had  been  prepared 
for  war  ever  since  1840,  but  the  Nicaragua  matter  it  was 
supposed  would  surely  bring  on  the  long-looked-for  contest. 

To  add  to  the  dangers  of  the  situation,  a  dispute  had 
arisen,  meantime,  over  the  northwestern  boundary  of 
the  United  States,  a  controversy  commonly  referred  to  in 
history  as  the  Oregon  Question.  The  United  States 
claimed  the  territory  as  far  north  as  the  south  line  of  Alaska, 
then  belonging  to  Russia,  in  latitude  54°  40'.  The 
British  claimed  as  far  south  as  the  Columbia  River.  The 
claims  created  great  excitement  in  this  country  in  1845,  ^^^ 
the  cry  of  "Fifty-four  forty,  or  fight"  was  heard  through- 
out the  nation. 

To  show  the  state  of  feeling  in  England  at  that  time, 
here  is  a  quotation  from  a  letter  written  by  Louis  McLean, 
American  Minister  to  London,  to  the  Secretary  of  State, 
January  3,  1846. 

"I  sought  an  interview  with  Lord  Aberdeen,  in  order 
that,  in  conformity  with  your  instructions,  I  might  bring 


DEEP-WATER  STEAMSHIPS  —  PART  I  245 

to  his  notice  the  warlike  preparations  making  by  Great 
Britain,  and,  if  possible,  ascertain  their  real  character  and 
object.  ...  In  introducing  the  subject  I  adverted  at 
the  same  time  to  the  information  the  President  had  received 
from  various  sources,  of  the  extensive  preparations  making 
by  Great  Britain,  and  the  natural  inference  upon  his  part 
that,  in  the  present  pacific  state  of  the  relations  of  Great 
Britain  with  all  the  powers  of  Europe,  they  could  only  look 
to  a  rupture  with  the  United  States.  .  .  .  Lord  Aberdeen 
said  very  promptly  and  frankly  that  it  would  be  improper 
to  disguise  that,  with  the  sincerest  wish  to  avoid  it,  they 
were  obliged  to  look  to  the  possibility  of  a  rupture  with 
the  United  States,  and  that  in  such  a  crisis  the  warlike 
preparations  now  making  would  be  useful  and  important. 
...  He  stated  that  the  most  extensive  and  formidable 
parts  of  their  preparations  were  the  fortifications  of  the 
principal  and  exposed  stations  .  .  .  and  to  Ihe  increase 
of  the  number  of  steam  vessels  in  lieu  of  the  old  craft." 
(See  Cong.  Globe,  February  6,  1847.) 

In  short,  during  the  whole  period  under  consideration, 
the  Americans  and  the  British  were  constantly  animated 
by  intense  antipathy  and  even  animosity,  each  toward 
the  other. 

While  turning,  now,  to  the  story  of  the  evolution  of 
British  steamships,  it  will  be  worth  while  to  recall  first  what 
has  already  been  said  about  the  environment  that  developed 
the  character  of  the  American  sailor.  From  the  day  when 
the  men  of  Massachusetts  Bay  built  ships  and  launched 


246    THE   STORY   OF  THE   MERCHANT  MARINE 

forth  in  them  to  catch  fish  and  trade  with  foreign  countries, 
until  such  men  as  Palmer,  Samuels,  and  Waterman  made 
marvellous  speed  with  whatever  form  of  ship  they  happened 
to  command,  the  whole  environment  of  the  American 
seafaring  population  had  served  to  develop  excellence  in 
handling  ships  of  the  sail. 

With  this  fact  in  mind,  note  that  steamers  made  an  ex- 
traordinary change  in  the  conditions  of  transportation 
by  ships.  These  conditions  were  so  far  removed  from  the 
old  that  a  portrait-painter  who  had  never  learned  any  of 
the  arts  of  the  sea  designed  the  first  commercially  success- 
ful steamer  in  the  United  States.  The  keeper  of  a  bath- 
house performed  a  similar  service  for  the  British  public. 
When  steam  navigation  had  become  an  assured  success, 
the  splendid  skill  of  the  sailor  oj  the  sail  was  no  longer 
needed.  The  man  at  the  throttle  usurped  the  place  of 
the  man  on  the  weather  yard-arm,  and  this  is  true  in  spite 
of  the  curious  and  absurd  fact  that  even  now  the  captains 
of  steamships  do  not  reach  the  bridge  by  way  of  the  stoke- 
hole. 

Then  recall  the  fact  that  while  the  United  States  had 
produced  excellent  sailors  of  the  sail,  there  was  such  a 
dearth  of  mechanics  in  Fulton's  day  that  he  was  obliged 
to  import  the  Clermont^ s  engine  from  England ;  and  Stevens, 
though  he  built  his  own  engines,  was  obliged  to  train  men 
to  work  in  iron  before  he  could  do  so.  The  British  had 
been  building  efficient  engines  for  twenty  years  before 
Fulton  bought  his.     In  every  application  of  steam  power, 


DEEP-WATER   STEAMSHIPS  —  PART  I  247 

the  British  were  that  much  in  advance  of  the  Ameri- 
cans. 

As  Day  points  out  in  his  History  of  Commerce,  inventors 
living  in  the  United  States,  as  well  as  in  other  countries, 
went  to  England  to  perfect  their  inventions,  because  of 
the  superior  facilities  afforded  in  British  machine  shops; 
and  this  was  done  as  late  as  1836  —  even  later.  Some  of 
the  best  machinery  invented  in  the  United  States,  in  the 
period  under  consideration,  was  first  put  in  use  in  Great 
Britain. 

The  fact  that  abundant  supplies  of  coal  were  to  be  had 
at  low  price  in  Great  Britain  is  not  to  be  overlooked  in 
connection  with  this  argument.  With  the  consequent 
great  progress  in  factory  industries,  the  time  was  close  at 
hand  when  all  England  was  to  become  "a  free  port" 
for  all  the  world,  as  well  as  a  place  for  working  up  the  raw 
materials  of  all  other  countries. 

Still  another  important  fact  is  this,  that  the  American 
capitalists  who  began  to  invest  in  steamships  at  an  early 
day,  found  immense  stretches  of  inland  waters  upon  which 
to  develop  the  carrying  trade,  while  the  inland  waters  of 
Great  Britain  were  of  insignificant  extent,  and  the  capitalists 
there  were  soon  engaged  in  the  coasting  trade  where  the 
waters  were  by  no  means  pacific.  In  18 18  the  Rah  Roy 
was  put  on  the  route  between  Glasgow  and  Belfast,  and 
a  little  later  she  was  sent  to  ply  between  Dover  and  Calais. 
In  1822  a  line  was  established  between  Liverpool  and  Glas- 
gow, and  this  was  followed  in  1826  by  a  line  plying  between 


248     THE   STORY   OF   THE   MERCHANT  MARINE 

Edinburgh  and  London.  These  last  ships  were  160  feet 
long  and  were  provided  with  engines  of  200  horse-power; 
they  were  regarded  as  such  marvellous  ships  that  people 
came  from  all  parts  of  the  kingdom  to  look  at  them.  And 
it  is  to  be  noted  that  all  the  coasters  so  far  mentioned  were 
provided  with  a  form  of  engine  (the  side  lever)  which  was 
efficient  for  deep-water  service. 

Following  the  success  of  the  Glasgow  line,  other  lines 
were  established  to  various  ports  of  Europe,  including 
one  to  Bordeaux,  the  ships  of  which  had  to  cross  the 
stormy  Bay  of  Biscay  and  traverse  a  route  1600  miles  long. 
All  of  this  is  to  emphasize  the  fact  that  while  the  steamship 
men  of  the  United  States  were  making  records  upon  the 
Hudson  and  other  inland  waters,  those  of  Great  Britain 
were  engaged  almost  exclusively  upon  waters  with  a  rend- 
ing power  little,  if  any,  less  than  that  of  the  Atlantic.  The 
environments  of  the  men  engaged  in  steamboat  traffic 
in  the  two  countries  were  so  different  that  widely  different 
classes  of  ships,  engines,  and  engineers  were  developed. 
The  British  had  been  navigating  the  Bay  of  Biscay  with 
success  for  several  years  before  the  Americans  put  the 
Home  upon  the  route  around  Cape  Hatteras. 

And  yet  it  was  an  American  that  first  stirred  up  the 
British  to  embark  in  the  transatlantic  steamer  trade  — 
Dr.  Junius  Smith,  who  graduated  from  Yale  in  1802,  and 
then  went  to  London  as  representative  of  some  American 
merchants.  The  success  of  the  British  coasters  led  Smith 
to  believe  that  transatlantic  steamers  would  prove  success- 


DEEP-WATER   STEAMSHIPS  —  PART  I  249 

ful,  and  in  1832  he  came  to  the  United  States  to  look  into 
the  matter  more  fully. 

"  My  friends  in  New  York  make  no  doubt  of  the  practica- 
bility nor  of  the  success  of  such  an  undertaking,"  he  wrote 
to  a  director  of  the  London  and  Edinburgh  Steam  Packet 
Company,  "and  have  assured  me  that  they  will  build 
two  steam  vessels  suited  to  the  object  in  view,"  provided 
English  capitalists  would  build  two  more  for  use  in  the  same 
line.  Mr.  Smith's  letter  was  written  to  invite  the  directors 
of  the  company  to  join  in  the  enterprise,  and  to  charter 
to  him  one  of  their  steamers  for  a  demonstration  trip,  to 
New  York.  The  directors  replied  with  a  cold  refusal. 
Smith,  however,  tried  elsewhere,  and  when  his  plans  were 
presented  in  the  newspapers,  the  professional  humorists 
gave  much  attention  to  the  "Yankee"  innovator.  In 
1836  a  noted  scientist  of  the  period,  Dr.  Lardner,  in  a 
lecture  at  Liverpool,  declared  that  any  effort  to  make 
direct  passages  from  New  York  to  Liverpool  would  prove 
"perfectly  chimerical,  and  they  might  as  well  talk  of  mak- 
ing the  direct  voyage  from  New  York  or  Liverpool  to  the 
moon." 

When  this  lecture  was  reported  in  the  papers,  a  number 
of  steamship  men  showed  by  arguments  drawn  from  the 
experience  of  the  coasters  that  Lardner  was  wrong,  but 
even  with  their  assistance  Smith  made  two  vain  efforts 
to  organize  a  company.  But  in  July,  1836,  when  the  books 
were  again  opened,  enough  shares  were  taken  to  enable 
the  company  to  build  a  good  ship  which  in  time  proved 


250     THE   STORY   OF   THE   MERCHANT  MARINE 

successful.  But  because  there  were  long  delays  in  getting 
this  vessel  afloat,  Smith's  company  chartered  the  steamer 
Sirius,  a  packet  plying  between  London  and  Cork,  for 
a  voyage  to  New  York. 

The  Sirius  was  of  about  the  size  of  a  large  sailing 
packet  of  the  day.  She  measured  700  tons  and  had 
engines  of  320  horse-power.  On  April  4,  1838,  she  left 
Cork  for  New  York. 

In  the  meantime,  I.  K.  Brunei,  who  was  then  chief 
engineer  of  the  Great  Western  Railroad,  had  become  con- 
vinced of  the  feasibility  of  transatlantic  steam  navigation, 
and  with  a  few  associates  he  had  built  at  Bristol  a  ship 
named  the  Great  Western,  especially  for  traffic  between 
Bristol  (the  end  of  the  Great  Western  Railroad)  and 
New  York.  This  ship  was  212  feet  long  by  35  wide  and 
23  deep.  She  registered  at  1340  tons.  She  was  provided 
with  side-lever  engines  of  440  horse-power,  the  cylinders 
being  73^  inches  in  diameter  by  7  feet  stroke. 

As  it  happened,  the  Great  Western  left  Bristol  for  New 
York  on  April  7,  and  transatlantic  steam  navigation  was 
thereby  begun  with  a  race.  The  Sirius  arrived  first,  an- 
choring off  the  Battery,  New  York,  early  in  the  morning 
on  April  23.  The  excitement  in  the  city  was  extraordinary, 
and  the  water  about  the  ship  was  soon  covered  with  small 
boats  carrying  people  for  a  look  at  her.  And  then  at 
about  II  o'clock,  when  the  throngs  around  the  Sirius  were 
densest,  a  lookout  announced  another  steamship  in  sight 
down  below,  when  the  crowd  began  to  shout :  — 


DEEP-WATER   STEAMSHIPS  —  PART  I  251 

"The  Great  Western!     The  Great  Western!" 

It  was  she,  and  in  the  middle  of  the  afternoon  she  an- 
chored off  Pike  Street. 

The  British  consul,  in  a  letter  congratulating  Lieutenant 
R.  Roberts,  R.N.,  commanding  the  Sirius,  on  arriving  first, 
said :  — 

"I  have  a  further  cause  of  rejoicing,  that  the  honor  of 
accomplishing  the  enterprise  has  been  achieved  by  a  son 
of  the  British  navy,  and  that  it  was  completed  on  St. 
George's  Day." 

It  was  five  years  after  this  arrival  that  the  keel  of  the 
first  American  clipper  was  laid,  but  with  the  termination 
of  the  passages  of  these  two  ships  the  dawn  of  the  day  of 
British  supremacy  upon  the  high  seas  appeared. 

Special  attention  seems  due  to  the  Great  Western,  be- 
cause she  was  the  first  ship  built  for  the  traffic.  She 
had  steamed  3125  sea  miles,  making  an  average  of  208 
miles  per  day,  or  8.2  knots  an  hour.  The  total  con- 
sumption of  fuel  was  655  tons,  less  than  a  day's  consump- 
tion in  some  modern  ships.  She  returned  home  with  a 
consumption  of  only  392  tons,  prevailing  winds  and  a  large 
spread  of  canvas  helping  her  to  save  coal.  The  cost  of 
this  ship  was  ;^5o,ooo,  of  which  ;^i3,5oo  was  paid  for  the 
engines.  She  continued  to  ply  regularly  on  the  route,  and 
on  September  25,  1838,  the  New  York  American  had  this 
to  say :  — 

"The  arrival  of  the  steam  packet  Great  Western  puts 
us  in  possession  of  intelligence  to  the  8th.  .  .  .     The 


252     THE   STORY   OF   THE   MERCHANT  MARINE 

great  success  of  this  enterprise  has  confirmed  the  timid  and 
almost  crazed  the  sanguine.  She  brings  one  hundred  and 
forty  passengers.  All  her  berths  were  engaged  before  she 
arrived  at  Bristol."  Then  an  article  from  the  London 
Times  is  quoted  as  follows :  — 

"Upon  the  eighty-seven  passengers  home,  and  the  130 
out,  at  40  guineas  passage  money  per  head  in  the  saloon, 
and  35  guineas  in  the  cabin,  each  way,  the  directors  of  the 
Great  Western  will  have  received  upwards  of  ;(J8ooo, 
exclusive  of  the  benefit  derived  from  the  conveyance  of 
goods,  of  which  the  Great  Western  brought  from  New  York 
to  the  extent  of  about  200  tons'  measurement." 

The  Liverpool  Albion  is  then  quoted  as  saying  that  "the 
last  trip  of  the  Great  Western  netted  ;^6ooo," 

The  Great  Western  continued  in  the  New  York  and 
Bristol  and  the  New  York  and  Liverpool  trades  until  she 
had  made  seventy-four  passages,  and  she  was  then  sold 
for  use  between  England  and  the  West  Indies.  These 
facts  are  of  importance  to  the  history  of  the  American 
merchant  marine,  because  our  writers  who  have  favored 
paying  subsidies  to  American  steam  lines  have  asserted 
that  in  those  days  it  was  not  possible  to  run  steamship 
lines  between  the  United  States  and  England  without  a 
subsidy.  The  Great  Western  made  money  without  a 
subsidy.  So  did  many  other  steamers  that  followed, 
as  shall  appear. 

We  now  come,  however,  to  the  story  of  the  first  lines  of 
subsidized  transatlantic  steamships.     One  Samuel  Cunard, 


DEEP-WATER   STEAMSHIPS  —  PART  I  253 

a  wealthy  merchant  of  Nova  Scotia,  had  been  dreaming 
about  steam  navigation  since  1830,  and  when  the  Great 
Western  Company  had  shown  the  way,  he  went  to  England 
in  order  to  arrange  for  a  line  from  Liverpool  to  Halifax, 
and  thence  to  Boston.  After  consultation  with  eminent 
men  of  experience  in  steam  navigation,  he  gave  an  order 
to  Robert  Napier,  the  foremost  designer  and  builder  of 
steamships  in  the  kingdom,  for  four  steamships  of  about 
900  tons  each.  But  before  the  work  was  begun,  Napier 
convinced  him  that  larger  ships  would  prove  more  profit- 
able, and  as  the  larger  ships  would  cost  more  than  Cunard 
had  to  invest,  George  Burns,  of  Glasgow,  and  David 
Mclver,  of  Liverpool  (both  of  whom  were  men  of  ex- 
perience), were  united  with  him  in  forming  what  is  now 
known  as  the  Cunard  Company.  The  Britannia,  the 
first  ship  built  for  this  company,  was  a  wooden  vessel 
207  feet  long  by  34  wide  and  22  deep,  registering  1156 
tons.  She  had  engines  of  423  horse-power.  The  other 
three  ships  built  at  that  time  were  slightly  smaller. 

It  is  to  be  noted  that  this  company  was  formed  to  run 
ships  in  opposition  to  the  Great  Westerri  and  to  Smith's 
lines.  They  were  to  depend  upon  what  traffic  they  could 
get  for  success  and  upon  nothing  else.  But  in  the  mean- 
time the  British  government  had  been  considering  the 
advisability  of  employing  steamships  to  carry  the  royal 
mail  across  the  Atlantic.  Theretofore  certain  brigs  had 
been  employed  by  the  Admiralty  for  this  purpose,  and 
beginning   in    1821,   government-owned   brigs   were   em- 


254     THE   STORY  OF   THE   MERCHANT  MARINE 

ployed  exclusively.  This  proving  expensive,  the  plan  of 
hiring  privately  owned  brigs  was  resumed  in  1833,  and 
these  brigs  were  in  use  at  that  time.  The  success  of  the 
Great  Western  having  proven  the  efficiency  of  steamships 
in  the  transatlantic  trade,  the  postal  authorities,  in  con- 
nection with  the  Admiralty,  decided  to  use  steam,  and 
when  Cunard  came  into  the  field,  bids  were  invited  for 
a  mail  service  under  certain  burdensome  conditions  among 
which  were  these:  The  ships  were  to  be  fit  for  war  use, 
carrying  heavy  guns,  a  naval  officer  was  to  be  carried  to 
care  for  the  mail,  and  the  ships  were  to  be  sold  to  the 
Admiralty  on  demand  at  a  valuation.  The  Great  Western, 
as  well  as  the  Cunard  people,  put  in  bids.  The  Great 
Western  did  not  know  that  they  would  have  opposition, 
and  bid  accordingly,  with  the  result  that  Cunard  made 
the  better  offer  and  got  the  contract.  The  full  story  is 
told  in  Linsay's  History  of  Merchant  Shipping.  Cunard 
was  to  receive  at  first  £z'^9S  P^^"  voyage,  but,  the  plans 
having  been  modified,  the  subsidy  was  raised  to  ;^8 1,000 
a  year.  For  this  he  was  to  maintain  a  fortnightly  service 
from  Liverpool  by  way  of  Halifax  to  Boston,  and  with 
a  line  of  smaller  steamers  from  Halifax  to  Quebec,  The 
Britannia  left  Liverpool  upon  her  first  voyage  on  July  4, 
1840.  No  American  writer  has  as  yet  pointed  out  that 
this  was  "a  beautiful  coincidence  of  nominal  dates." 

A  few  months  later  the  Royal  Mail  Steam  Packet  Com- 
pany was  organized  especially  to  carry  the  mail  to  the  West 
Indies,  including  St.  Thomas,  Haiti,  and  Cuba,  and  to 


DEEP-WATER   STEAMSHIPS  — PART  I  255 

Chagres,  to  Mexico,  and  to  the  south  part  of  the  United 
States,  as  well.  A  branch  line  was  to  be  maintained  from 
the  West  Indies  to  Brazil.  The  contract  (made  in  Alarch, 
1841)  called  for  fourteen  steamships  built  so  as  to  carry 
"guns  of  the  largest  caliber"  then  in  use  in  the  navy; 
and  the  frames  and  planking  were  of  a  thickness  to  resist 
shot  as  well  as  a  frigate  —  as,  indeed,  were  those  of  the 
Cunard  line.  The  commanders  of  the  ships  were  to  be 
naval  officers.     The  subsidy  paid  was  ;;^24o,ooo  a  year. 

It  is  important  to  note  that  this  line  was  to  run  regularly 
to  Chagres,  where  there  was  not  enough  traffic  to  pay 
the  expense  of  the  ship  while  lowering  a  boat  to  carry 
the  mail  ashore,  and,  further,  that  there  was  not  enough 
traffic  anywhere  on  the  route  to  pay  any  considerable 
part  of  the  expense  of  the  line.  Indeed,  the  traffic  and 
subsidy  together  proved  insufficient  to  pay  expenses. 
Further  than  that,  the  time  allowed  in  all  the  ports  was 
limited  —  to  six  hours  at  the  important  island  of  Barba- 
dos, for  instance,  and  to  twenty-four  at  Port  Royal, 
Jamaica,  where  there  was  an  important  naval  station.  It 
was  impossible  to  handle  any  valuable  quantity  of  West 
India  cargo  in  such  short  periods.  It  is  therefore  certain  that 
frequent  and  swift  voyages  were  wanted  in  the  establish- 
ing of  this  line,  rather  than  the  carrying  of  cargo.  And 
this  is  to  say  that  it  was  established  for  the  same  reasons 
that  brigs  had  been  used  in  carrying  the  royal  mail  thereto- 
fore. It  was  a  political  and  military  service  that  the  ships 
were  to  perform. 


256     THE   STORY   OF   THE   MERCHANT  MARINE 

Consider  all  these  facts  in  connection  with  the  political 
complications  with  the  United  States  that  have  been 
mentioned.  It  was  in  1840  that  the  British  government 
demanded  the  release  of  McLeod  on  pain  of  war.  It 
was  at  that  time  that  the  people  of  Maine  and  New  Bruns- 
wick took  up  arms  in  connection  with  the  boundary 
dispute.  At  the  same  time  the  British  government  was 
looking  ahead  to  an  increase  of  territory  along  the  Spanish 
Main,  including  a  canal  across  Nicaragua  in  contempt 
of  the  Monroe  Doctrine. 

Then  recall  the  fact  that  the  use  of  steam  for  driving 
war-ships  was  yet  in  the  experimental  stage.  Many  able 
naval  men  believed  that  sails  were  yet  to  be  preferred,  but 
the  English  were  especially  anxious  to  learn  all  about  the 
new  power  in  order  to  keep  abreast  with  the  progress  of 
the  age  —  to  preserve  their  naval  superiority.  It  is  of 
significance  that  young  naval  officers  were  detailed  to 
command  all  of  the  West  India  ships  and  to  accompany 
those  of  the  Cunard  line.  Further  than  that,  it  is  to  be 
noted  that  the  Admiralty  insisted  that  the  subsidized  ships 
be  built  of  wood  not  only  then,  but  for  years  after  iron  had 
proved  cheaper  and  more  efficient  for  merchant  ships, 
and  this  was  done  because  it  was  fully  believed  that 
a  wooden  ship  was  best  for  naval  uses. 

In  short,  the  subsidizing  of  ships  was  begun  chiefly  as 
a  military  and  diplomatic  measure.  Any  candid  review 
of  the  facts  shows  it.  It  was  done,  too,  with  a  full  knowl- 
edge that  paying  a  subsidy  was  against  the   interests  of 


DEEP-WATER  STEAMSHIPS  —  PART  I  257 

the  other  owners  of  steamships  that  were  ah^eady  plying 
between  Liverpool  and  New  York,  In  fact,  the  Cunard 
line  had  hardly  learned  the  way  to  Boston  when  the  Great 
Western  line  made  such  loud  complaints  about  the  de- 
struction of  private  enterprise  through  the  subsidizing 
of  the  Cunard  that  a  committee  of  Parliament  took  up 
the  whole  matter  and  concluded  that  the  other  steamers 
would  not  be  put  out  of  the  trade. 

There  were  men  on  both  sides  of  the  Atlantic  who  saw 
at  that  time  that  steam  would  eventually  drive  sails  from 
the  packet  routes.  E.  K.  Collins  was  one  of  these  men. 
But  no  one  supposed  at  that  time  that  subsidizing  a  single 
mail  line  from  Liverpool  to  Boston  would  do  it.  And 
even  the  optimistic  Cunard  directors  made  no  effort  to 
interfere  with  the  traffic  of  the  New  York  and  Liverpool 
sailing  packets  until  it  was  seen  that  American  capitalists 
were  about  to  put  on  a  line  of  steamers  between  New  York 
and  Liverpool. 

With  these  facts  in  mind,  we  may  now  comprehend  the 
full  story  of  the  first  American  steam-packet  lines  that  ran 
across  the  Atlantic  Ocean. 


CHAPTER  XIV 

DEEP-WATER   STEAMSHIPS  —  PART  II 

THE  success  of  the  British  steamers  that  crossed  the 
Atlantic  in  1838  led  a  number  of  New  York  capi- 
tahsts  to  form  what  they  called  the  American  Atlan- 
tic Steam  Navigation  Company,  of  which  James  de  Peyster 
Ogden  was  chairman,  and  on  March  22,  1839,  calls  for 
subscriptions  to  the  capital  stock  were  published  in  the 
New  York  papers.  The  answers  to  the  calls  were  few, 
and  the  enterprise  was  abandoned. 

Out  of  several  reasons  for  this  failure,  consider  these: 
The  American  people  had  but  little  capital,  and  there  were 
calls  in  many  directions  for  every  dollar  obtainable.  The 
calls  from  the  railroads  were  particularly  insistent,  for 
while  the  first  railroad  to  use  steam  (the  Albany  and 
Schenectady)  was  completed  in  1833,  the  steam  mileage 
in  1840  was  2380.  The  inland  water  traffic  was  most 
attractive.  In  1839  the  enrolled  steamers  measured 
489,879  tons,  and  they  were  worn  out  so  rapidly  that  every 
vessel  had  to  be  replaced  (on  the  average)  within  four 
years.  Then  the  deep-water  sailing  ships  absorbed  much 
capital,  the  tonnage  in  1839  being  829,096,  while  the  coast- 

258 


DEEP-WATER  STEAMSHIPS  —  PART  II  259 

ing  tonnage  measured  1,032,023  tons,  and  all  these  vessels 
were,  on  the  average,  highly  profitable. 

Of  the  other  attractive  calls  for  capital,  nothing  need 
be  said,  but  a  brief  reference  to  an  attempt  to  form  a 
company  to  run  transatlantic  steamships  from  Philadel- 
phia may  be  quoted  from  Niles^s  Register  of  August 
25,  1838:  — 

"At  a  meeting  of  the  citizens  held  in  the  Merchants' 
Exchange,  Philadelphia,  to  take  such  measures  to  forward 
the  plan  for  a  communication  by  steam  between  that  city 
and  Europe  .  .  .  the  following  resolutions  were  unani- 
mously adopted:  .  .  .  Resolved  that  we  have  learned 
with  lively  satisfaction  the  willingness  of  our  brethren 
of  Great  Britain  to  cooperate  with  us  in  this  great  enter- 
prise" by  making  a  liberal  subscription  for  the  construction 
of  "such  steamships  as  might  be  needed." 

The  "brethren"  were  not  quite  as  willing  to  "cooperate  " 
as  was  supposed,  but  the  "great  enterprise"  was  taken  in 
hand  a  few  years  later  by  a  man  named  William  Inman, 
with  notable  results. 

In  considering  their  failures  to  organize  transatlantic 
steamship  companies,  these  business  men  did  not  fail  to 
refer  to  the  fact  that  the  British  government  was  paying 
subsidies  to  the  Cunard  and  the  Royal  Mail  steamship 
companies.  The  fact  that  the  Cunard  subsidy  was  a  hard- 
ship for  the  owners  of  the  unsubsidized  steamers  in  the 
American  trade  was  not  dwelt  upon.  The  people  were 
told  that  subsidies  were  given  in  order  to  build  up  a  steam 


26o     THE  STORY   OF   THE   MERCHANT   MARINE 

merchant  marine.  Then  Congress  was  invited  to  consider 
the  fact  that  in  subsidizing  two  lines  of  steamships  Great 
Britain  had  secured  eighteen  fine  ships  fit  to  add  to  her 
growing  steam  naval  fleet.  Naval  officers  were  carried 
on  all  those  ships,  and  they  were  not  only  learning  how  to 
handle  steam,  but  they  were  learning  to  navigate  American 
waters  —  and  all  this  at  a  period  when  England  and  the 
United  States  were  on  the  verge  of  war. 

Thereupon  Thomas  Butler  King,  chairman  of  the  House 
Naval  Committee,  brought  forward  a  plan  for  a  subsidized 
mail  line  under  the  American  flag.  (Ho.  Reps.  68 1  and  685, 
28  Cong.  I  sess.)  His  arguments  in  favor  of  a  subsidy 
were :  That  a  reduction  might  be  made  in  the  rate  of  post- 
age, and  yet  the  income  from  the  mails  would  soon  pay  all 
the  subsidy  that  would  be  required.  That  our  naval 
officers  would  learn  how  to  handle  steam.  That  we  should 
learn  how  to  build  efficient  steamships  for  deep  water. 
That  a  line  to  the  north  of  Europe  would  promote  emigra- 
tion and  trade.  In  connection  with  this  last  argument 
it  was  stated  that  the  British  post-office  authorities  were  in 
the  habit  of  holding  up  all  mails  bound  across  England 
to  the  continent  until  the  British  merchants  had  had  time 
to  read  and  act  upon  their  advices  from  America,  and 
the  newspapers  had  had  time  to  print  all  the  American 
news.  After  considering  the  matter  for  four  years.  Con- 
gress acted,  on  March  3,  1845,  in  a  bill  providing  — 

"That  the  Postmaster-general  ...  is  hereby  author- 
ized ...  to  contract  for  the  transportation  of  the  United 


DEEP-WATER   STEAMSHIPS  —  PART  II  261 

States  mail  between  any  of  the  ports  of  the  United  States, 
and  a  port  or  ports  of  any  foreign  Power,  whenever, 
in  his  opinion,  the  public  interest  will  thereby  be  pro- 
moted ...  for  any  greater  period  than  four  years  and 
not  exceeding  ten  years.  All  such  contracts  shall  be  made 
with  citizens  of  the  United  States,  and  the  mail  to  be 
transported  in  American  vessels  by  American  citizens." 

Thereupon  the  Postmaster-general  contracted  with 
Edward  Mills  of  New  York,  who  agreed  to  build  ships  to 
plans  approved  by  the  Secretary  of  the  Navy,  and  run  a 
steam-packet  line  from  New  York  to  Southampton  and 
Bremen,  twenty  voyages  a  year,  for  a  subsidy  of  $400,000. 
If  alternate  voyages  were  made  to  Havre  instead  of  Bremen, 
the  subsidy  was  to  be  $350,000. 

Mills  and  his  associates  were  incorporated  (May  8, 1846), 
as  the  Ocean  Steam  Navigation  Company.  Contracts 
were  let  for  the  building  of  two  steamships,  and  then  the 
troubles  of  the  company  began.  On  learning  that  an 
American  company  was  to  enter  the  transatlantic  trade,  the 
Cunard  Company  began  running  packets  regularly  to  New 
York.  The  opposition  of  this  established  line  increased 
the  timidity  of  capitalists  so  much  that  in  spite  of  the  guaran- 
teed income  of  at  least  $350,000  a  year,  it  was  impossible  to 
obtain  the  needed  money  in  the  United  States,  and  "money 
was  furnished  for  the  undertaking  by  the  little  govern- 
ment of  Bremen,  and  by  individuals  connected  with  the  en- 
terprise on  the  other  side  of  the  Atlantic,  and  pretty  largely 
furnished,  too."     (App.  Cong.  Globe,  September  4,  1850.) 


262     THE   STORY  OF  THE   MERCHANT  MARINE 

The  one  deadly  misfortune  of  the  company,  however, 
was  found  in  the  fact  that  the  Americans  had  not  yet 
learned  how  to  build  ocean-going  steamships.  Said  the 
Merchants^  Magazine,  May,  1849,  regarding  the  first  ships 
of  the  line :  — 

"The  models  of  the  Washington  and  Hermann  were 
quite  defective,  particularly  so  in  having  a  very  narrow 
bottom,  which  made  them  load  deep  and  be  tender  or  even 
crank  at  all  times.  .  .  .  Their  engines  also  were  not  quite 
strong  or  stiff  enough.''^ 

The  boilers  were  not  large  enough  to  furnish  an  adequate 
supply  of  steam  and  the  paddle-wheels  were  too  large  for  the 
engines.    The  Scientific  American,  October  7, 1848,  said :  — 

"The  great  cause  of  our  unsuccess  in  our  Atlantic 
steamers  is  owing  to  our  short  acquaintance  with  the  build- 
ing of  marine  ships.  There  is  science  and  genius  among 
our  nautical  engineers,  but  they  want  experience.''^ 

When  our  first  American  mail  steamer  sailed  for  Europe 
no  practical  marine  engineers  could  be  found  to  work  her 
engines.  She  took  a  first-class  engineer  and  corps  of  assist- 
ants from  one  of  the  New  York  river  packets ;  but  as  soon  as 
the  ship  got  to  sea,  and  heavy  breakers  came  on,  all  the  en- 
gineers and  firemen  were  taken  deadly  seasick;  and  for 
three  days  it  was  constantly  expected  that  the  ship  would 
be  lost.     (Rainey's  Ocean  Steam  Navigation.) 

It  is  to  be  noted  here  that  John  L.  Stevens,  the  ablest 
American  marine  engineer  of  his  day,  was  one  of  the  direc- 
tors of  this  company. 


DEEP-WATER   STEAMSHIPS  —  PART  11  263 

The  Washington  sailed  for  Southampton  and  Bremen 
on  June  i,  1847.  ^^^  passengers  and  crew  looked  forward 
to  a  cheering  reception  on  the  other  side;  for  when  the 
Sirius  and  the  Great  Western  arrived  in  New  York  the 
people  of  the  city  turned  out  to  honor  them,  and  the  city 
authorities  and  such  bodies  as  the  Chamber  of  Commerce 
gave  public  receptions  in  honor  of  the  event.  Then  when 
the  Cunard's  first  liner  the  Britannia  was  frozen  in  at  Bos- 
ton the  merchants  of  the  city  contributed  $10,000,  for  which 
a  contractor  agreed  to  saw  a  channel  for  her  to  clear  water. 
The  contractor  spent  $20,000  in  doing  the  work.  He  spent 
$10,000  out  of  his  own  pocket  without  a  murmur,  and  the 
Cunard  Company  without  a  murmur  let  him  do  it.  But 
the  only  official  action  taken  on  the  arrival  of  the  Washing- 
ton at  Southampton  was  in  the  sending  of  a  notice  to  the 
American  mail  agent  that  he  would  have  to  pay  full  sea 
postage  on  all  mail  landed,  as  well  as  the  usual  inland  rates. 
And  the  only  word  of  welcome  spoken  in  the  port  was  ut- 
tered by  the  officials  of  the  dock  company  with  whom  the 
ship  was  berthed. 

Because  of  their  financial  difficulties  the  company  or- 
ganized a  separate  corporation  to  build  and  run  ships  to 
Havre.  The  Humbolt  and  the  Franklin  were  put  on  this 
route  in  1849.  The  Humbolt  was  wrecked  at  Halifax, 
December  5,  1853,  and  the  Franklin  stranded  on  Montauk 
Point,  July  17,  1854.  The  Arago  and  Fulton,  built  to 
replace  these  two,  were  somewhat  better  than  any  ocean- 
going steamships  theretofore  built  in  the  United  States, 


264     THE   STORY   OF   THE   MERCHANT   MARINE 

and  they  were  able  to  continue  the  service  until  the  gov- 
ernment chartered  them  for  use  in  the  Civil  War  (1861). 
The  two  Bremen  ships  were  laid  up  after  their  subsidy 
ceased  —  1859.  All  six  of  these  ships  used  by  this  cor- 
poration were  slow  as  well  as  expensive  to  operate.  The 
time  used  in  the  Bremen  passage  was  about  fourteen  days; 
that  to  Havre,  twelve. 

The  Collins  Line  (New  York  and  Liverpool  U.S.  Mail 
Steamship  Company),  was  the  most  famous  of  the  subsi- 
dized lines.  E.  K.  Collins  was  a  Truro,  Cape  Cod,  boy, 
who,  at  the  age  of  fifteen  (181 7),  became  a  clerk  to  a  New 
York  merchant.  Five  years  later  he  was  sent  to  sea  as  a 
supercargo,  and  a  little  later  he  became  a  partner  in  the 
business.  His  first  memorable  stroke  of  business  was  made 
in  1825,  when  cotton  took  a  sudden  rise  in  the  Liverpool 
market.  The  news  of  the  rise  reached  New  York  on  the  day 
that  the  regular  Charleston,  South  Carolina,  packet  was  to 
sail,  and  a  number  of  New  York  merchants  took  passage  on 
the  ship,  intending  to  buy  all  the  cotton  in  Charleston  before 
the  news  of  the  rise  could  be  learned  there.  As  the  packet 
passed  the  bar  at  Sandy  Hook,  bound  out,  the  merchants 
on  her  deck  saw  a  pilot-boat,  with  young  Collins  on  her 
deck,  head  away  down  the  coast;  and  with  one  accord  they 
made  jeering  remarks  at  the  idea  of  a  little  schooner  trying 
to  beat  the  regular  packet  in  such  a  race.  But  when  they 
reached  the  Charleston  bar  they  met  the  boat  with  Collins 
on  board  coming  out.     He  had  bought  all  the  cotton. 

With  money  made  in  that  deal  and  with  some  obtained 


DEEP-WATER   STEAMSHIPS  —  PART  II  265 

by  marrying  a  rich  wife,  Collins  started  the  New  Orleans 
packet  line,  and  another  line  thence  to  Tampico.  These 
having  proved  successful,  he  then  established  the  famous 
Dramatic  Line  to  Liverpool.     In  1840,  Collins  said :  — 

"There  is  no  longer  chance  for  enterprise  with  sails.  It 
is  steam  that  must  win  the  day.  I  will  build  steamers  that 
shall  make  the  passage  from  New  York  to  Europe  in  ten 
days  and  less." 

In  the  winter  of  1 846-1 847  Collins  and  others  persuaded 
Congress  to  pass  the  act  dated  March  3,  1847.  I^  P^O" 
vided  for  the  construction  of  four  naval  steamers  in  place  of 
ten  that  the  naval  committee  had  asked  for;  for  a  contract 
between  the  Secretary  of  the  Navy  and  Collins  &  Co., 
for  transporting  the  mail  between  New  York  and  Liver- 
pool ;  for  a  contract  between  the  Secretary  of  the  Navy  and 
A.  G.  Sloo  for  transporting  the  mail  between  New  York  and 
New  Orleans  with  a  stop  at  Havana,  and  from  Havana  to 
Chagres,  on  the  Isthmus  of  Panama  —  known  as  the  Law 
Line,  from  George  Law,  the  leading  capitalist;  for  a  con- 
tract with  unnamed  capitalists  (C.  H.  Aspinwall  was  the 
leader),  for  a  mail  service  between  Panama  and  the  ports 
of  San  Francisco  and  Astoria. 

Collins's  company  had  a  paid-in  capital  of  $1,200,000. 
By  his  contract,  signed  in  November,  1847,  he  was  to  re- 
ceive $19,250  per  voyage  for  making  two  voyages  per 
month  for  eight  months  of  the  year  and  one  a  month  dur- 
ing four  winter  months.  For  this  service  Collins  was  to 
build  four  steamships  measuring  "not  less  than  2000  tons 


266     THE   STORY   OF   THE   MERCHANT  MARINE 

each,"  and  complete  them  ready  for  sea  within  eighteen 
months;  also  a  fifth  ship  "as  early  as  may  be  practicable 
thereafter."  Each  ship  was  to  carry  a  naval  officer,  as 
mail  agent,  and  four  passed  midshipmen  to  serve  as  deck 
officers. 

Contracts  were  made  for  the  four  ships,  and  many  differ- 
ent statements  have  been  made  regarding  their  size  and 
cost.  Chief  Engineer  Isherwood,of  the  navy,  put  the  size 
of  the  Atlantic  and  the  Pacific  at  2686  tons  each;  the  Arctic 
and  Baltic  at  2772.  Senator  Rusk,  of  Texas,  who  vigor- 
ously supported  the  line  in  all  its  appeals  to  Congress,  said 
the  four  measured  11,131  tons  in  the  aggregate.  The 
Merchant's  Magazine  (Vol.  22,  p.  682)  rated  them  at  3500 
tons  each  and  said  they  cost  $650,000  each.  G.  S.  Hous- 
ton, in  a  speech  in  Congress  on  July  7,  1852,  quoted  the 
company  to  prove  that  the  average  cost  of  the  ships  was 
$736,035.67  each. 

With  a  paid-up  capital  of  $1,200,000,  four  ships  were 
built  that  cost  at  least  twice  as  much  as  the  money  in  hand 
would  pay  for,  and  they  were  each  at  least  700  tons  larger 
than  the  contract  called  for.  The  builders  gave  Collins 
credit,  and  thereby  secured  the  work  on  their  own  terms. 
And  yet  while  thus  paying  the  highest  prices  for  his  ships, 
and  with  an  ever  growing  debt  staring  him  in  the  face,  Col- 
lins was  recklessly  extravagant  in  furnishing  his  cabins,  and 
in  every  department  of  the  company's  management. 

As  a  result,  within  six  months  after  the  contract  was 
signed  with  the  Secretary  of  the  Navy,  Collins  was  back  in 


DEEP-WATER  STEAMSHIPS  —  PART  II  267 

the  lobby  at  Washington,  "begging  and  boring"  for  fur- 
ther help.  By  the  act  of  August  3,  1848,  the  Secretary  of 
the  Navy  was  authorized  to  advance  $25,000  a  month  on 
each  of  the  four  ships  until  they  should  be  put  into  commis- 
sion, and  the  time  for  completing  them  was  extended  to 
June  I,  1850.  Under  a  subsequent  agreement  this  advance 
was  paid  back  in  small  instalments. 

And  during  all  this  time  Collins  walked  the  streets,  telling 
all  who  would  listen  that  he  was  going  to  run  the  Scotch- 
built,  Scotch-managed  Cunarders  off  the  sea  ! 

When  done,  the  ships  were  found  to  have  fine  models  — 
they  rode  the  waves  in  a  way  that  excited  the  admiration 
of  all  sailors.  But  the  keelsons  under  the  engines  were  only 
forty  inches  deep,  while  the  keels  were  277  feet  long,  and 
there  was  "give"  enough  to  rack  the  engines  to  pieces  —  a 
fact  showing  conclusively  the  ignorance  of  the  designer  so 
far  as  ocean  steamships  were  concerned.  And  yet  George 
Steers,  the  famous  designer  of  the  yacht  America,  was  the 
responsible  man !  As  the  Scientific  American  had  said  of 
our  engineers,  he  "wanted  experience." 

The  Atlantic  began  the  service  on  April  27,  1850.  It  was 
in  this  year  that  the  average  American  sailing  ship  was 
making  three  voyages  where  foreign  ships  made  but  two. 
For  thirty  years  our  sailing  packets  had  carried  the  broom 
on  the  North  Atlantic.  The  captains  of  the  Canton  tea 
clippers,  dressed  in  raw  silk,  were  strutting  about  the  water 
front,  boasting  of  passages  that  were  the  wonder  of  the 
world.     And  here  was  a  new  line  of  steamers  with  a  manag- 


268     THE   STORY   OF   THE   MERCHANT  MARINE 

ing  owner  who  had  won  fame  as  the  owner  of  swift  ships, 
and  who  had  been  assuring  the  whole  world  that  he  was 
going  to  beat  all  creation  with  steam ! 

In  the  mind  of  the  captain  of  the  Atlantic  the  honor  of 
the  Stars  and  Stripes  was  in  his  custody,  and  he  could  keep 
it  safe  only  by  driving  the  ship  to  the  utmost  limit  of  speed. 
And  each  of  the  other  ships  was  also  driven  to  the  last  gasp. 
In  May,  1851,  the  Pacific  ran  from  New  York  to  Liverpool 
in  9  days,  20  hours,  and  16  minutes.  In  August,  1852, 
the  Baltic  crossed  from  Liverpool  to  New  York  in  9  days 
and  13  hours.  Collins  had  kept  his  promise  to  drive  a 
ship  across  the  Atlantic  in  less  than  ten  days. 

In  the  meantime,  the  Cunard  Company,  to  meet  the  de- 
termined opposition,  built  new  ships,  and  the  British  gov- 
ernment raised  the  subsidy  to  $16,500  per  voyage.  Orders 
were  issued  in  England  to  drive  the  new  Cunarders,  too, 
but  it  was  impossible  for  them  to  equal  the  rampant  Collins 
liners  at  that  time. 

For  a  time  it  seemed  to  the  American  people  that  the 
supremacy  upon  the  seas  was  to  be  maintained  with  steam, 
and  not  a  few  Englishmen,  including  the  editor  of  the 
London  Times,  took  a  pessimistic  view  of  the  situation.  A 
little  later,  however,  the  situation  was  seen  in  its  true  light. 
On  February  15,  1851,  when  the  Atlantic  had  been  in  com- 
mission but  ten  months,  the  Scientific  American  said 
editorially  that  "  it  is  very  foolish  to  push  through  a  steam- 
ship on  a  long  passage  by  dint  of  coal."  The  New  York 
Herald,  a  nautical  specialist,  was  complaining,  meantime, 


DEEP-WATER  STEAMSHIPS  — PART  II  269 

that  the  American  firemen  were  wretchedly  inefficient.  It 
was  admitted  by  the  company,  later  still,  that  for  the  first 
twenty-eight  voyages  of  the  line  the  average  cost  of  coal 
was  $8612.28,  the  amount  consumed  being  well  up  toward 
2000  tons. 

And  yet  the  big  coal  bill  was  one  of  the  least  of  the  evils 
of  the  situation.  By  driving  the  engines  to  the  limit 
on  every  mile  of  the  route  the  weak  timbers  under  the 
engines  were  needlessly  strained,  with  the  result  that  the 
engines  were  racked  out  of  line  and  torn  to  pieces.  No 
sooner  did  a  ship  get  rid  of  its  passengers  at  the  pier  than 
an  army  of  machinists  came  on  board  to  make  repairs ;  and 
they  were  employed  in  relays,  day  and  night,  until  the  pas- 
sengers came  to  the  pier  for  the  next  passage. 

"Either  the  scale  upon  which  it  was  planned  was  not 
required,  and  could  not  be  sustained  by  the  country,  or  it 
has  been  most  shamefully  mismanaged,"  said  Congress- 
man Borland,  in  a  speech  in  the  House,  on  May  17,  1852, 
in  reference  to  the  Collins  Line.  Collins  had  come  to  Con- 
gress for  an  increase  in  the  subsidy,  and  a  statement  of  the 
company's  affairs  which  he  submitted  shows  that  Borland 
was  right  in  both  ends  of  his  statement.  (See  App.  Cong. 
Globe,  32  Cong,  i  sess.)  The  statement  is  dated  Decem- 
ber 15,  1851.  It  showed  that  the  expenses  for  the  first 
twenty-eight  voyages  had  averaged  $65,215.59.  The  in- 
come was  —  for  passengers,  $21,292.65;  freights, $7,744.20, 
subsidy,  $19,250,  —  a  total  of  $48,286.85,  leaving  a  net  loss 
of  $16,928.74  per  voyage. 


270     THE   STORY   OF   THE   MERCHANT  MARINE 

Because  Collins  had  broken  some  records,  and  because 
it  was  believed  that  his  ships  would  serve  in  case  of  war, 
and  because  he  had  reduced  the  cost  of  carrying  package 
freight,  and  because  Congress  heartily  hated  everything 
British,  the  subsidy  was  increased  to  $33,000  per  voyage 
for  twenty-six  voyages  a  year.     (Act  of  March  3,  1854.) 

For  a  time  thereafter  Collins  was  free  to  continue  his 
extravagant  career.  Having  luxurious  furnishings,  he 
gained  in  the  cabin  passenger  trade.  He  also  gained  some- 
what in  the  package  freight  business.  The  advent  of  the 
Crimean  War  (March  27,  1854,  to  March  31,  1856), 
helped  him  because  the  British  government  took  and  used 
several  of  the  Cunard  steamers  as  transports  (as  war-ships, 
even  the  Cunarders  were  a  sham).  The  Cunard  service 
was  thereby  reduced  and  he  thus  had  opportunity  to  sail 
in  alternate  weeks  with  the  remaining  Cunarders.  But 
even  then  no  profits  were  made.  The  line  never  paid  a 
dividend. 

In  the  meantime,  the  Scotchmen  were  learning  to  race 
their  ships,  and  in  1855  they  built  the  Persia,  an  iron  ship 
of  3300  tons,  and  3600  actual  horse-power;  and  with  her, 
in  September,  1856,  they  crossed  in  9  days,  2  hours, 
and  40  minutes,  thus  making  a  new  record. 

Collins  built  the  Adriatic,  the  fifth  ship  under  the  con- 
tract, and  the  records  agree  that  she  was  a  very  swift  ship, 
but  by  no  means  a  profitable  one.  Moreover  she  appeared 
too  late;  for  by  the  act  of  August  18,  1856,  Congress  gave 
notice  to  Collins  that  the  subsidy  would  be  reduced,  a  year 


DEEP-WATER   STEAMSHIPS  —  PART   H  271 

later,  to  the  original  sum  of  $19,250  per  voyage.  At  the 
same  time  it  became  certain  that  no  subsidy  would  be  paid 
after  the  end  of  the  original  term  of  the  contract  —  ten 
years. 

In  the  meantime  the  line  lost  the  Arctic.  While  running 
at  a  speed  of  thirteen  knots  an  hour  through  a  heavy 
fog,  forty  miles  off  Cape  Race,  and  making  no  sort  of 
signal  to  notify  other  vessels  of  her  presence  in  those  waters, 
she  was  rammed  by  the  French  steamer  Vesta,  and  sunk 
with  a  loss  of  307  lives.  It  has  been  asserted  that  she  went 
down  because  the  modern  system  of  bulkheads  had  not 
been  invented.  As  a  matter  of  fact,  the  Norwich  liner 
Atlantic,  a  ship  built  in  1846,  had  a  collision  bulkhead, 
and  other  ships  had  been  divided  by  several  bulkheads 
before  the  time  of  the  Arctic,  but  experience  shows  that 
no  system  of  bulkheads  as  yet  installed  has  been  able 
to  save  a  ship  when  rammed  in  the  engine-room.  Then 
on  September  23,  1856,  a  little  more  than  a  month  after 
Congress  decided  to  reduce  the  subsidy,  the  Pacific  sailed 
from  Liverpool,  and  was  never  heard  from  afterward. 
The  two  ships  thus  lost  were  together  insured  for 
$1,250,000,  chiefly  in  England,  and  the  money  was  paid 
to  the  company. 

The  line  continued  its  service  after  the  subsidy  was 
cut  (June  30,  1857),  but  a  financial  panic  swept  over 
the  commercial  world  in  the  fall  of  that  year,  and  with 
the  consequent  loss  of  business  the  line  failed.  The 
last  voyage  was  made  in  January,  1858.     In  April,  follow- 


272     THE   STORY   OF   THE   MERCHANT  MARINE 

ing,  the  sheriff"  sold  the  ships  (subject  to  claims  of  $657,000) 
for  $50,000.  Collins  died  at  his  home  in  Madison  Avenue, 
New  York  City,  in  June,  1878,  and  was  buried  in  Wood- 
lawn  Cemetery. 

"I  knew  the  Collins  line  very  well.  .  .  .  They  burned 
an  immense  quantity  of  coal;  they  were  fitted  out  and 
fitted  up  in  the  most  sumptuous  manner;  they  had 
large  crews,  a  large  number  of  officers  and  a  large  number 
of  engineers,  for  they  had  most  powerful  engines.  They 
were  run  at  full  speed,  and  the  company  had  not  enough 
ships  on  the  line  to  enable  them  to  have  proper  relays 
so  that  they  began  to  deteriorate  very  rapidly,  and  they  ran 
them  out  in  a  very  short  time.  They  had  very  large 
buildings  in  New  York,  a  great  many  officers  and  a  great 
many  people  connected  with  them.  All  these  had  to  be 
paid.  Then  there  were  a  great  many  deadheads,  so  that 
I  used  to  be  astonished  how  they  kept  running  at  all." 
(Admiral  Porter,  H.  R.  Rep.  28,  41st  Cong.  2  sess.  p.  192.) 

Two  other  lines,  subsidized  under  the  act  of  March  3, 
1847,  need  a  brief  consideration.  One  was  the  Sloo  Line, 
which,  as  noted,  ran  steamships  from  New  York  by  the 
way  of  Havana,  to  New  Orleans,  with  a  branch  line  to 
Chagres,  on  the  Isthmus  of  Panama.  The  subsidy  paid 
was  $290,000  a  year.  The  first  ship  (the  Falcon),  left 
New  York  in  September,  1848.  The  Pacific  coast  con- 
tract went  to  the  Pacific  Mail  Steamship  Company  at 
$308,000  per  year.  The  first  ship  on  this  line  left  New 
York  on  October  6,  1848. 


DEEP-WATER   STEAMSHIPS  —  PART  II  273 

In  providing  for  these  lines  Congress  had  been  in- 
fluenced chiefly  by  a  desire  to  meet  the  British  diplomacy 
in  establishing  the  Royal  Mail  Line  to  the  West  Indies, 
the  Isthmus,  and  Mexico.  But  the  desire  to  provide 
ships  fit  for  war  was  also  in  mind,  and  some  enthusiasts 
supposed  that  the  line  would  in  some  way  increase  Ameri- 
can commerce  with  the  countries  of  the  Pacific  coast, 
especially  those  at  the  south  of  the  Isthmus,  where  an 
American  named  William  Wheelwright  had  established 
a  coast  line  with  British  capital.  It  is  seen  now,  that 
neither  of  these  lines  could  have  made  money  under  the 
contracts,  and  that  none  of  the  hopes  of  Congress  would 
have  been  satisfied  but  for  the  discovery  of  gold  in  Cali- 
fornia and  the  consequent  rush  of  emigrants  to  the  gold- 
fields.  Because  of  the  traffic  thus  supplied  both  lines 
were  immensely  profitable.  The  Pacific  Mail  made  money 
in  spite  of  the  fact  that  coal  cost  $30  a  ton  (one  lot  $50), 
and  there  were  no  shops  anywhere  on  the  coast  for  the 
repair  of  ships  until  the  company  established  works  of 
the  kind.  In  fact,  the  enormous  profits  brought  unsubsi- 
dized  steamers  into  competition  with  both  the  lines.  Com- 
modore C.  Vanderbilt,  who  had  earned  fame  as  a  steam- 
ship man  on  the  Hudson  River  and  Long  Island  Sound, 
was  one  of  the  "  interlopers,"  and  he  was  paid,  at  one  time, 
$56,000  a  month  to  keep  his  ships  out  of  the  traffic  (Cong. 
Globe,  June,  1858).  The  Panama  railroad,  which  was 
completed  at  midnight,  January  27,  1855,  was  built  as 
a  connecting  link  between  these  two  lines;    and  one  gets 

T 


274     THE   STORY    OF   THE    MERCHANT   MARINE 

an  idea  of  the  extent  of  the  traffic  thereafter  from  the  fact 
that  in  the  first  seven  years  it  was  operated  (including 
the  traffic  on  the  uncompleted  line  beginning  in  1852) 
the  earnings  amounted  to  $5,971,728.66  (Otis,  Isthmus 
of  Panama). 

Brief  space  will  suffice  for  the  stories  of  the  unsubsidized 
transatlantic  steamships  of  the  period.  In  1848  the 
owners  of  the  Black  Ball  Line  of  sailing  packets  attempted 
to  substitute  steam  for  sail  by  building  the  steamer  United 
States,  a  ship  of  1904  tons,  which  they  despatched  to  Liver- 
pool. But  because  of  the  competition  of  the  subsidized 
ships  it  was  not  possible  to  make  her  pay.  The  subsidized 
ships  were  able  to  cut  rates  on  all  kinds  of  traffic,  of  course, 
and  this  was  naturally  done  when  thfc  new  ship  was  seeking 
cargo. 

This  fact  seems  to  be  of  much  importance.  It  is  a 
fact  beyond  dispute  that  subsidies  to  a  few  favored  lines 
greatly  injured  all  other  shipping  trading  to  the  same  ports 
—  it  injured  British  as  well  as  American  shipping.  In 
fact,  the  British  ship-owners,  as  already  noted,  were  injured 
so  much  that  they  made  emphatic  protests  to  their  govern- 
ment, but  they  were,  in  the  long  run,  able  to  survive  the 
effects  of  the  unfair  practice.  In  the  United  States  the 
paying  of  subsidies  to  the  few  lines  simply  killed  private 
enterprise  on  the  North  Atlantic. 

In  the  meantime,  Captain  R.  B.  Forbes,  of  Boston,  built 
the  auxiliary  screw  steamer  Massachusetts  (1845),  ^  ship 
with  full  sail-power  and  a  screw  that  could  be  lifted  out 


DEEP-WATER   STEAMSHIPS  — PART  II  275 

of  water  when  the  wind  served.  She  made  two  voyages 
between  New  York  and  Liverpool,  after  which  she  was 
sold  to  the  government  for  use  in  the  war  with  Mexico. 
A  number  of  ships  have  been  built  on  this  principle  since 
then,  and  there  are  several  in  the  lumber  trade  on  the 
Pacific  coast  at  this  time  (1910),  but  for  some  unexplained 
reason  auxiliaries  have  never  become  fashionable. 

In  1850  William  Inman,  of  England,  established  the 
line  for  which  the  Philadelphia  merchants  had  hoped  in 
1837,  and  two  American  steamships,  the  Pioneer  and  the 
Cily  of  Pittsburg,  made  a  voyage  or  two  each  in  the  ser- 
vice, but  they  were  then  withdrawn  and  used  in  more 
profitable  traffic  on  the  Pacific  coast. 

In  1855  Commodore  Vanderbilt  offered  to  establish  a 
Liverpool  line,  to  run  in  alternate  weeks  with  the  Collins 
Line,  if  a  subsidy  of  $15,000  a  voyage  were  paid  him  and 
he  were  allowed  to  make  no  shorter  passages  than  the 
Cunard  Line;  if  Collins  Line  speed  were  demanded,  he 
wanted  $19,250  a  voyage.  This  was  when  Collins  was 
receiving  $33,000.  The  only  result  of  the  offer  was  to  help 
turn  public  sentiment  against  Collins.  Vanderbilt  had 
already  constructed  two  large  steamers  (the  North  Star, 
called  his  yacht,  and  the  Ariel)  for  use  in  his  Isthmian 
competition,  and  when  he  failed  to  get  a  subsidy  contract, 
he  made  a  few  voyages  in  the  Bremen  route  and  to  Havre, 
omitting,  however,  all  voyages  in  the  winter  months. 
With  a  view  of  increasing  his  service  he  built  a  still  larger 
ship,  called  the  Vanderbilt,  and  he  was  able  to  arrange  with 


276     THE   STORY  OF  THE   MERCHANT  MARINE 

the  Post-office  Department  for  the  sea  and  inland  postage 
on  all  mail  carried.  During  the  four  years  (1858-1861) 
during  which  this  arrangement  lasted,  his  mail  receipts 
amounted  to  $360,730.48,  according  to  Morrison.  He 
made  some  money,  and  it  is  likely  that  the  service  would 
have  developed  into  a  permanent  line  but  for  the  Civil 
War. 


CHAPTER   XV 

THE   CRITICAL   PERIOD 

IF  ships  under  the  American  flag  are  ever  again  to 
obtain  any  share  of  the  deep-water  carrying-trade  of 
the  world,  it  is  of  the  utmost  importance  that  the 
American  people  should  learn  first  of  all  why  American 
ships  lost  the  trade  they  once  enjoyed. 

To  enable  us  to  comprehend  the  reasons  for  the  deca- 
dence of  our  merchant  marine  it  is  necessary  to  have  well 
in  mind  the  fact  that  we  obtained  our  supremacy  by  actual 
merit.  It  was  an  economic  development,  not  the  result 
of  any  kind  of  political  or  other  stimulation.  We  did  not 
gain  or  hold  supremacy  because  we  could  build  ships 
cheaper  than  they  could  be  built  elsewhere.  Cheaper 
ships  could  be  had  in  the  north  of  Europe  and  in  Canada. 
Moreover  our  most  profitable  ships  were  those  that  cost 
the  most  per  ton.  The  American  ships  were  supreme, 
too,  rather  because  the  wages  paid  were  higher  then  in 
spite  of  that  seeming  handicap.  In  short,  the  whole 
environment  of  the  American  seafaring  population  had 
evolved  a  ship  and  crew  which,  taken  together  as  a  unit, 
were  able  to  give  more  ton-miles  for  a  dollar  than  any  other 
similar  unit  in  the  world. 

*77 


278     THE   STORY   OF   THE   MERCHANT   MARINE 

At  first  the  advent  of  steamships  changed  these  con- 
ditions in  but  one  respect ;  it  gave  greater  regularity  of  pas- 
sage. The  swiftest  sailing  ships  could  cross  the  Atlantic, 
now  and  then,  in  as  short  a  time  as  the  steamer,  and  they 
carried  more  cargo  at  the  same  time.  But  the  steamer 
instantly  commanded  the  cream  of  the  traffic,  and  received 
higher  rates  for  it,  because  the  merchant  could  calculate, 
within  a  day,  the  time  required  for  the  passage.  The  time 
of  even  the  swiftest  of  sailing  ships  was  sometimes  extended 
by  adverse  winds  to  fifty  or  sixty  days. 

This  is  to  say  that  even  the  first  crude  steamships  took 
the  best  of  the  trade  because  they  were  more  efficient. 

With  the  inevitable  improvements  in  steamships  came 
an  encroachment  upon  the  cheaper  traffic  that  had  been 
carried  on  sailing  ships,  and  the  most  important  of  these 
improvements  was  made  when  the  screw  propeller  was 
adopted. 

Stevens  had  driven  a  small  boat  with  screws  before 
Fulton  built  the  Clermont,  but  John  Ericsson,  a  Swede, 
was  the  first  to  develop  screw  propulsion  in  a  practical 
manner.  His  first  work  was  done  in  England,  where 
he  built  a  screw  steamer  45  feet  long  with  which  he  made 
a  speed  (April,  1837)  of  ten  miles  an  hour  on  the  Thames. 
Then  he  towed  the  American  packet  ship  Toronto  at  a 
speed  of  four  and  a  half  miles  an  hour.  On  July  7,  1838, 
an  iron  vessel  70  feet  long  by  10  wide,  and  having  a  draft 
of  6  feet  9  inches,  named  the  Robert  F.  Stockton^  was 
launched  at  Laird    &  Co.'s  yard,  Birkenhead,  England, 


THE  CRITICAL   PERIOD  279 

for  Captain  Robert  F.  Stockton,  U.S.N.  It  was  fitted 
with  an  engine  and  an  Ericsson  screw.  It  was  then  brought 
to  America  under  sail,  and  set  to  work  under  steam  as 
a  tug  on  the  Delaware  River,  where  it  earned  much  money 
for  many  years. 

In  1839  Ericsson  came  to  the  United  States  and  built 
the  screw  steamship  Princeton  for  our  navy,  the  first  war- 
ship of  the  kind  in  commission. 

In  the  meantime  Francis  P.  Smith,  an  English  farmer, 
was  developing  screw  propulsion,  and  succeeded  in  con- 
vincing the  Admiralty  that  the  screw  was  a  practical  device, 
with  the  result  that  many  experiments  were  tried  and  the 
screw  was  much  improved. 

In  introducing  the  screw,  two  difficulties  were  encoun- 
tered. The  engines  of  the  day  gave  only  about  twenty- 
five  revolutions  to  the  minute,  and  it  was  therefore  neces- 
sary to  introduce  some  sort  of  multiple  gearing  between 
the  engine-shaft  and  the  screw  shaft;  for  a  screw  should 
turn  at  seventy-five  times  a  minute,  or  more.  The  other 
defect  of  screw  propulsion  was  found  in  the  strain  of  the 
shaft  upon  the  stern  of  the  ship.  No  combination  of 
timbers  in  a  wooden  ship  could  resist  that  strain  for  any 
great  length  of  time.  To  the  English,  however,  this 
was  a  matter  of  no  moment,  for  iron  had  already  been 
used  for  building  hulls.  The  first  of  these  iron  ships  was 
the  Aaron  Manby,  launched  in  London,  in  1820,  but 
the  iron  ship  that  first  really  influenced  the  British  mer- 
chant marine  was  the  Great  Britain,  built  for  the  Great 


28o     THE   STORY  OF  THE   MERCHANT  MARINE 

Western  Steamship  Company  at  Bristol,  in  1843.  She 
was  a  big  ship  for  her  day  (322  feet  long),  and  she  was  not 
only  a  profitable  cargo  carrier,  but,  having  been  stranded 
on  the  coast  of  Ireland,  she  endured  the  poundings  of  the 
storms  of  an  entire  winter,  and  was  then  hauled  off,  re- 
paired at  small  expense  (considering  the  storms  she  had 
endured),  and  when  put  at  work  again  was  found  to  be 
as  serviceable  as  ever. 

As  the  Great  Britain  was  driven  by  a  screw  the  use  of 
iron  screw  ships  soon  became  fashionable  in  the  British 
merchant  marine,  and  the  more  rapidly  because  they  were 
much  more  economical  in  the  use  of  coal. 

Lindsay  {History  of  Merchant  Shipping)  says  that  the 
repeal  of  the  ancient  British  navigation  laws  helped  to 
turn  British  merchants  to  the  screw  steamer.  They  were 
unable  to  compete  with  the  Americans  in  the  use  of  sails, 
and  had  to  take  up  the  new  ship  or  abandon  the  sea.  The 
Cunard  Company  would  have  adopted  iron  ships  promptly 
but  for  the  contract  with  the  Admiralty.  The  naval 
ofl5cers  supposed  that  wooden  walls  were  better  for  keep- 
ing out  shot  than  iron,  and  it  was  not  until  1855,  as  noted, 
that  this  company  was  allowed  to  use  the  best  material. 
The  fact  that  a  subsidy  thus  restrained  enterprise  seems 
important  here. 

For  a  number  of  years  the  iron  screw  steamer  had  small 
effect  upon  the  transatlantic  trade.  The  owners  of  the 
sailing  packets  were  making  as  much  money  as  ever  — 
perhaps  more  than  ever,  for  they  were  building  larger 


THE   CRITICAL   PERIOD  281 

ships.  In  1850,  however,  William  Inman,  an  English- 
man who  had  been  interested  in  sailing  ships,  put  on  a  line 
of  iron  screw  packets  between  Liverpool  and  Philadelphia, 
as  noted,  and  that  line  sealed  the  doom  of  the  sailing 
packet.  For  the  Collins,  the  Bremen,  and  the  Cunard 
lines  had  taken,  or  were  to  take,  only  the  cabin  passengers 
and  the  express  freight  from  the  sailing  packets,  while 
Inman  was  after  the  steerage  passengers  and  the  coarser 
freight.  The  emigrants  were  all  travelling  from  Europe 
to  America.  The  greater  part,  in  bulk,  of  the  freight 
carried  across  the  Atlantic  travelled  from  America  to 
Europe.  Inman  filled  his  ships  with  emigrants  bound 
west,  and  with  coarse  freight  bound  east.  Having  a 
cargo  both  ways  is  a  most  important  feature  of  success- 
ful navigation.  Inman  made  money  from  the  first  voyage, 
and  he  did  so  without  a  penny  of  subsidy.  The  City  of 
Manchester,  of  his  line,  made  a  net  profit  of  40  per  cent 
the  first  year. 

For  the  sake  of  emphasis  let  it  be  said  that  our  trans- 
atlantic sailing  packets  lost  their  trade,  not  because  the 
Cunard  Company  received  a  subsidy,  and  not  because 
Collins  lost  the  subsidy  he  had  been  receiving,  but  be- 
cause of  the  evolution  of  a  cargo  carrier  that  was  far  more 
efficient  than  the  American  ship  of  the  sail  at  its  best.  And 
the  Collins  and  Bremen  lines  were  beaten  because  they, 
too,  were  much  less  efficient  than  their  competitors. 

The  reader  may  now  ask  why  the  American  ship-owner 
did  not  adopt  the  iron  screw  steamer.    A  brief  review  of 


282     THE   STORY   OF   THE   MERCHANT  MARINE 

the  conditions  will  answer  the  question.  He  could  secure 
all  the  capital  he  needed  for  the  well-tried  sailing  ship, 
but  no  one  would  advance  money  for  what  seemed  to  be, 
then,  an  experiment  with  a  curious  device  not  yet  well 
tried  out.  Almost  incredible  as  the  statement  may  seem 
now,  the  most  influential  American  ship-owners,  during 
the  years  before  the  Civil  War,  refused  to  have  anything 
to  do  with  the  screw  propeller.  In  an  essay  on  "  Screw 
Propulsion  in  the  United  States,"  read  before  the  Amer- 
ican Society  of  Naval  Architects  and  Marine  Engineers, 
at  a  meeting  held  in  New  York  in  November,  1909,  Mr. 
Charles  H.  Cramp,  vice-president  of  the  Society,  said 
(see  Shipping  Illustrated,  November  20,  1909):  — 

"  The  supremacy  of  British  propulsion  practically  be- 
gan with  the  advent  of  the  fine  screw  steamship  Great 
Britain  in  1844,  but  New  York  interests  would  not  con- 
sider any  other  than  the  paddle-wheel,  with  its  walking- 
beam  engine;  and  as  they  knew  nothing  of  any  other 
type,  they  loudly  and  persistently  proclaimed  its  superior- 
ity over  all  other  types,  and  carried  with  them  the  ship- 
owners, shipbuilders,  shipping  men,  mariners,  and  all  others 
in  general,  and  the  screw  propeller  was  sneered  at  by  them." 

Mr.  Cramp,  having  been  a  shipbuilder  in  Philadelphia 
during  the  period  considered,  spoke  from  personal  knowl- 
edge. 

Of  equal  interest  is  the  state  of  the  iron  trade  in  Amer- 
ica at  that  time.  The  clippers  that  were  the  pride  of  the 
nation  were  bolted  together  with  British  iron.     All  the 


THE   CRITICAL   PERIOD  283 

large  castings  used  in  the  Collins  steamers  were  imported 
from  England.  In  his  essay  quoted  above,  Mr.  Cramp 
had  this  to  say  on  iron  ship-building:  — 

"  A  short  time  after  iron  construction  was  introduced 
abroad,  certain  engine  builders  here  commenced  iron  con- 
struction. The  first  one  in  America  was  built  in  Ken- 
sington at  the  boiler  works  of  Jesse  Starr,  several  squares 
from  the  water,  and  was  hauled  down  there  by  a  large 
number  of  horses  and  then  launched.  .  .  .  The  first 
iron  steamers  here  were  fearful  specimens  of  naval  archi- 
tecture ;  the  workmen  were  the  boiler-makers  of  the 
works,  and  the  vessels  were  looked  on  by  these  engine- 
builders  as  merely  exaggerated  boilers.  At  first  they  em- 
ployed commonplace  shipwrights  to  do  certain  woodwork 
that  the  vessel  needed.  The  British  soon  began  to  build 
the  entire  ship  complete  by  first-class  ship-builders,  and 
the  finest  specimens  of  war-ships  and  merchant  ships 
were  turned  out  by  them.  In  this  country  iron  ships 
were  built  with  their  engines  by  the  boiler-makers  and 
machinists  with  the  most  indiflferent  results." 

Said  John  Roach,  a  most  noted  ship-builder,  in  testify- 
ing before  the  committee  of  Congress  that  investigated 
the  state  of  American  shipping  in  1869  (H.  R.  Rep.  28, 
41  Cong.  2  sess.):  — 

"The  high  cost  of  iron,  produced  by  the  tariff  upon  it, 
was  one  of  the  principal  diiTiculties  that  our  commerce 
had  to  contend  with,  ...  If  Congress  will  take  off  all 
the  duties  from  American  iron,  reducing  it  to  the  price 


284     THE   STORY  OF   THE   MERCHANT  MARINE 

of  foreign  iron,  then  we  are  prepared  to  compete  with 
foreign  ship-builders.  The  labor  question  is  misstated. 
We  are  prepared  to  meet  that  dii^culty,  and  to  ask  no 
further  legislation  upon  the  subject." 

The  tariff  was  not  as  high  before  the  war  as  it  was  after, 
but  the  inability  of  the  American  ship-builder  to  obtain 
iron  at  home  for  any  purpose  at  a  living  price  had 
great  influence  in  preventing  the  adoption  of  iron  screw 
steamers. 

Of  the  influence  of  lack  of  experience  in  building  sea- 
going steamships,  something  more  must  be  said  here,  and 
leading  authorities  of  the  period  shall  tell  the  facts :  — 

"Hitherto  our  steamboats  have  been  built  for  short  and 
comparatively  unstormy  voyages.  The  navigation  of  the 
Atlantic  is  quite  a  different  affair  from  that  of  the  Hudson 
or  the  Erie.  Now  in  England  they  have  had  the  prac- 
tical experience  of  thirty-six  years  in  building  sea-going 
steamers."     (Scientific  American,  October  7,  1848.) 

Charles  H.  Cramp,  another  noted  ship-builder,  when 
testifying  before  the  committee  of  Congress  mentioned 
above  said :  — 

''  Great  Britain  now  had  the  advantage  of  this  country 
in  the  carrying  trade  of  the  world,  not  because  the  vessels 
constructed  were  superior  to  ours  in  model,  but  because 
of  the  great  superiority  of  their  marine  engines.  The 
English  have  built  the  finest  and  best  marine  engines  in 
the  world.  We  have  always  been  inferior  to  her  in  that 
respect.''^ 


THE   CRITICAL   PERIOD  285 

Senator  Rusk,  of  Texas,  who  was  chairman  of  the 
Senate  "  Committee  on  the  Post  Office  and  the  Post 
Roads,"  in  the  course  of  a  report  made  to  the  Senate 
under  date  of  June  15,  1852,  described  at  some  length 
the  difficulties  under  which  the  Collins  Line  was  then  labor- 
ing in  spite  of  the  subsidy  it  was  receiving.  In  laying 
special  stress  upon  the  expense  of  running  these  ships  he 
said  that  it  was  in  part  due  to  "the  w^ell-known  fact  that, 
at  the  period  when  they  were  commenced,  there  were  no 
machine  shops  in  this  country  in  which  castings  of  the 
size  required  could  be  made,  nor  were  there  on  this  side 
of  the  Atlantic,  experienced  practical  engineers  competent 
to  take  charge  of  marine  engines  of  such  immense  size.  .  .  . 
It  is  not  to  be  supposed  that  engines  of  such  vast  dimen- 
sions could  have  been  constructed  in  a  country  where 
there  were,  as  yet,  no  workshops  adapted  to  the  purpose  and 
where  labor  is  very  high,  as  cheaply  as  in  a  country  where 
every  appliance  of  the  kind  already  existed  and  where 
the  prices  of  labor  are  proverbially  low.  Nor  can  it  he 
reasonably  imagined  that  vessels  of  this  description  could 
have  been  navigated  upon  as  good  terms  by  men  taken  from 
this  country."     (Sen.  Rep.  Com.  267,  32  Cong,  i  sess.  pp. 

3-4). 

That  the  iron  screw  steamer  was  steadily  driving  all 
American  ships  from  the  sea,  was  plainly  seen  several 
years  before  the  war,  and  sufficient  warnings  were  printed 
in  the  periodicals  of  the  day.  Said  the  Scientific  American 
on  May  16,  1857:  — 


286     THE   STORY   OF   THE   MERCHANT  MARINE 

"There  are  no  less  than  thirty  steamships  now  running 
between  New  York  and  different  ports  in  Europe.  These 
are  regular  steamers  carrying  passengers  and  merchandise, 
beside  which  there  are  a  number  of  transient  ones  that  carry 
cargo  only.  But  ten  of  them  are  American  vessels,  while 
the  Boston,  Portland,  and  Philadelphia  lines  are  entirely 
European.  The  Atlantic  trade  is  departing  from  us,  and 
unless  our  shipping  merchants  exhibit  more  practical 
wisdom  and  enterprise  they  will  ultimately  he  vanished 
in  this  contest.  The  whole  number  of  steamships  engaged 
upon  the  routes  between  Philadelphia,  New  York,  Boston, 
Portland,  Halifax,  and  Quebec,  on  this  side  of  the  Altantic 
and  the  ports  of  HavTe,  Bremen,  Hamburg,  vSouthampton, 
London,  Liverpool,  and  Glasgow,  on  the  other  side,  is 
fifty-one.  Of  these  only  seventeen  have  paddle-wheels: 
all  the  others  —  thirty-four  —  are  screw  propellers  with 
iron  hulls.  They  are  the  most  economical  of  steamships; 
their  steam  power  is  but  small  in  proportion  to  their  ton- 
nage; they  make  very  regular  and  quick  passages,  carry 
large  cargoes,  charge  but  little  more  freight  than  sailing 
vessels,  and  merchants  prefer  them  for  carrying  goods. 
These  are  the  steamers  that  are  fast  'routing  out'  our 
sailing  craft  in  the  Atlantic  trade." 

Of  the  foreign  ships  mentioned  above,  only  the  Cunard 
received  a  subsidy. 

That  was  in  1857.  On  March  31,  i860,  the  Scientific 
American  again  referred  to  the  subject :  — 

"Three  years  ago  we  directed  attention  to  the  great 


THE   CRITICAL   PERIOD  287 

increase  of  foreign  screw  steamers,  and  showed  clearly 
how  they  were  rapidly  taking  away  the  trade  that  had  been 
formerly  carried  by  American  ships.  ,  .  .  Our  mer- 
chants did  not  heed  this  injunction,  and,  as  a  consequence, 
their  rivals  have  grown  stronger,  while  they  have  become 
weaker.  To-day  nearly  all  the  mail  and  passenger,  be- 
sides a  great  deal  of  the  goods,  traffic,  is  carried  by  foreign 
ships,  the  great  majority  of  which  are  iron  screw  steamers. 
These  facts  are  indisputable;  how  can  we  account  for 
them  but  upon  the  theory  that  iron  screw  steamers  are 
the  cheapest  and  best  for  the  traffic  ?  .  .  .  We  exhort  our 
shipping  merchants  to  examine  the  question  candidly  for 
themselves,  ...  for  we  assure  them  that  'the  Philistines 
are  upon  them  ! '  We  have  not  a  single  new  Atlantic  steam- 
ship on  the  stocks,  from  one  end  of  the  country  to  the  other, 
while  in  Great  Britain  there  are  16,000  tons  of  new  iron 
screw  steamers  building  for  the  American  trade." 

It  was  in  those  days  that  the  "  New  York  interests," 
as  Mir.  Cramp  says,  "  carried  with  them  the  ship-owners, 
ship-builders,  shipping  men,  mariners,  and  all  others  in 
general,"  while  they  sneered  at  the  screw  propeller. 

Other  quotations  to  show  how  and  why  the  British 
secured  supremacy  are  worth  making.  Said  the  Nautical 
Magazine  (New  York)  for  February,  1856,  regarding 
two  steamers  that  had  been  compared  in  all  particulars:  — 

"The  extraordinary  fact  which  presses  itself  upon  our 
notice  from  the  foregoing  details  by  trials  consists  in  the 
difference  in  power  required  in  the  two  vessels  to  produce 


288     THE   STORY   OF   THE   MERCHANT  MARINE 

nearly  identical  speed  .  .  .  2050  H.P.,  economized  by 
the  screw,  propelled  the  Himalaya  at  about  the  same 
speed  as  3016  H.P.,  transmitted  by  paddles,  propelled  the 
Atrato:' 

The  New  York  Journal  of  Commerce  published  the 
following  warning  in  1857  :  — 

"While  we  are  learning  [to  build  steamships]  England 
is  using  her  advantages.  Their  merchants,  captains,  engi- 
neers, and  sailors  are  carrying  on  our  trade,  and  taking 
the  bread  from  our  mouths." 

Congressman  Nelson  Dingley,  Jr.,  of  Maine,  a  prominent 
advocate  of  the  subsidy  system,  in  an  article  in  the  North 
American  Review,  dated  April,  1884,  said:  — 

"At  the  time  Great  Britain  accepted  our  invitation  to 
participate,  on  equal  terms  in  the  business  of  "  transporta- 
tion (it  was  in  1849),  "experiments  in  iron  ship  building 
and  steam  propulsion  were  going  on  in  that  country, 
which,  as  early  as  1855,  began  to  work  a  revolution  in  marine 
architecture.  .  .  .  This  revolution  from  wood  to  iron 
and  sails  to  steam  at  once  began  to  deprive  the  American 
merchant  marine  of "  the  advantages  it  had  enjoyed. 

The  total  number  of  British  steamers  receiving  mail  pay, 
or  subsidy,  in  1857,  ^^'^^  ^^i,  including  the  vessels  plying 
to  Ireland,  the  Isle  of  Man,  the  Orkneys,  and  other  near-by 
points;  among  which  was  one  line  sending  two  steamers 
a  day  over  its  route.  (See  Nautical  Magazine,  Septem- 
ber, 1857.)  The  total  number  of  steamers  under  the 
British  flag,  in  1857,  was  2132   (Rep.  Com.  of  Nav.   for 


THE   CRITICAL   PERIOD  289 

1901,  p.  472).  It  is  manifest  that  the  mail  pay  aided 
the  121  steamers  thus  favored;  it  is  equally  manifest  that 
the  201 1  unsubsidized  steamers  were  not  only  obliged  to 
depend  on  their  intrinsic  merit  for  profit,  but  they  were 
obliged  to  compete  on  unfair  terms  in  all  the  trades  (like 
that  from  Liverpool  to  New  York)  where  the  subsidized 
steamers  were  employed. 

The  progress  made  by  the  British  iron  screw  steamer 
thereafter  was  pointed  out  by  John  Roach,  in  the  course 
of  his  testimony,  quoted  above,  when  he  said  (p.  177) 
he  "had  found  out  by  personal  examination  that  there 
were  119  iron  steamships  plying  between  the  ports  of 
America  and  Great  Britain.  Of  that  number  no  were 
running  to  the  port  of  New  York." 

A  brief  space  must  be  given  to  a  commonly  accepted 
statement  to  the  effect  that  the  members  of  Congress  from 
the  South,  in  the  decade  before  the  Civil  War,  were 
opposed  to  the  payment  of  subsidies  to  American  steamers 
because  of  prejudice  against  the  North.  Marvin,  in  the 
American  Merchant  Marine,  names  Jefferson  Davis  and 
three  of  the  men  who  were  afterwards  associated  with  him 
in  his  cabinet  as  president  of  the  Confederacy,  as  leaders 
in  this  assault  upon  a  Northern  industry.  The  reader  who 
is  interested  in  making  a  candid  study  of  the  facts  can  find 
many  speeches  made  by  Congressmen  from  all  parts  of  the 
country,  in  the  Glohe  for  the  period  in  question.  Part  III, 
for  185  7-1858,  will  be  found  most  interesting  in  connection 
with  this  charge  against  Mr.  Davis.     On  page  2832,  third 


290     THE   STORY   OF   THE   MERCHANT  MARINE 

column,  are  the  following  words  uttered  by  him  (he  was 
then  a  senator),  on  the  method  of  j)aying  subsidies:  — 

"Having  established  the  mail  line  the  question  is,  how 
shall  the  compensation  be  stated.  In  one  of  these  amend- 
ments it  seems  it  is  to  be  the  postal  receipts.  I  think 
that  altogether  an  objectionable  method,  and  I  shall  vote 
against  that  amendment  for  the  reason  that  this  is  to  be  a 
fluctuating  amount.  .  .  .  The  company  cannot  bear  the 
fluctuation.  The  depression  of  commerce,  the  existence 
of  war,  or  some  other  cause,  may  limit  the  correspondence, 
and  cut  off  passenger  and  light  freight,  and  then  a  line 
relying  on  postage  receipts  might  not  be  able  to  run;  whilst 
if  the  government  allowed  from  year  to  year  a  fixed  sum 
...  it  might  keep  up  the  line." 

Later  Mr.  Davis  voted  as  he  had  talked.  It  is  but  fair 
to  say  that  he,  together  with  other  senators  and  members  of 
Congress,  believed  that  the  payment  of  subsidies,  as  a 
national  policy,  was  objectionable,  but  so,  too,  did  Ben 
Wade  of  Ohio,  and  other  pronounced  opponents  of  the 
"slave  oligarchy."  Senator  Rusk,  of  Texas,  was  as  firm 
in  his  support  of  the  utterly  reckless  Collins  Line  as  was 
Seward  of  New  York. 

The  assertion,  so  often  made  at  the  North,  that  Con- 
gressmen from  the  Southern  States,  during  the  years 
immediately  preceding  the  Civil  War,  were  united  in  a 
conspiracy  to  injure  Northern  industries  in  order  there- 
by to  weaken  the  North  and  make  the  work  of  secession 
easier,  is  absolutely  without  foundation  in  fact.      It  is 


THE   CRITICAL   PERIOD  291 

as  absurd  as  the  similar  statement  to  the  effect  that  the 
Secretary  of  the  Navy  (Toucey,  a  Connecticut  man)  had 
scattered  the  ships  of  the  navy  all  over  the  world  to 
weaken  the  fighting  pov.er  of  the  general  government. 
The  truth  is  the  ships  were  not  as  badly  scattered  in 
i860  as  they  had  been  in  several  of  the  preceding  years. 
Thus  there  were  twelve  ships  upon  the  home  station  in 
i860,  but  only  five  in  185 1.  Further  than  that,  Toucey 
had  for  two  years  urged  upon  Congress  the  building  of 
seven  sloops  of  war  of  a  draught  of  only  fourteen  feet, 
and  Congress,  on  February  21,  1861,  appropriated  the 
money  for  that  purpose.  These  shoal-draught  vessels  were 
admirably  adapted  for  use  in  the  waters  along  the 
Southern  States,  and  that  fact  was  pointed  out  during 
the  discussion  in  the  House.  Nevertheless  several  mem- 
bers frorn  the  Southern  States  voted  for  the  hill. 

The  subsidy  policy  was  never  treated  as  a  sectional 
issue  in  Congress.  Hamlin,  of  Maine,  Vice-president  under 
Lincoln,  voted  with  the  opponents  of  the  subsidy  men. 
(Globe,  June  9,  1858,  p.  2837.) 

Hamlin's  opposition  is  especially  significant  because  he 
represented  the  great  mass  of  unsubsidized  ship-owners 
whose  business  was  injured  by  the  subsidized  ships,  and 
who  were  hot  in  their  opposition  to  Collins. 

Then  it  is  to  be  noted  that  a  chief  argument  urged  by 
these  Southern  men  against  the  payment  of  subsidies  to 
the  lines  then  in  question  was  based  on  the  belief  that  the 
ships  were  not  fit  for  war-ships  —  were,  in  that   respect. 


292     THE   STORY  OF  THE   MERCHANT  MARINE 

the  shams  they  are  now  known  to  have  been.  In  short, 
any  candid  reading  of  the  speeches  shows  that  in  this 
question  they  were  inspired  by  a  desire  to  do  what  was 
best  for  the  whole  nation. 

That  one  kind  of  sectional  Jealousy  hurt  the  Collins 
line  has  been  pointed  out  by  Smith,  in  The  Ocean  Carrier 
—  the  well-founded  jealousy  of  the  ship-owners  of  Boston, 
Philadelphia,  and  Baltimore.  The  clipper  ship-owners 
of  New  York  also  bitterly  opposed  the  Collins  Line.  In 
fact,  these  unsubsidized  ship-owners  combined  to  fight  the 
Collins  lobby  at  Washington,  and  it  was  their  influence 
that  struck  the  "terrible  blow"  which  Marvin  says  was 
inflicted  by  the  Southern  members  of  Congress. 

The  influence  of  the  Civil  War  upon  the  merchant 
marine  must  now  have  consideration.  First  of  all,  the 
appearance  of  Confederate  privateers  upon  the  ocean  at 
once  doubled  the  rate  of  insurance  on  all  American  mer- 
chantmen. Then,  when  Commander  J.  D.  Bullock,  of 
the  Confederate  navy,  was  sent  to  England  to  buy  iron- 
clad war-ships  with  which  to  raise  the  blockade  of  Con- 
federate ports,  and  was  induced  to  build  swift  cruisers 
with  which  to  raid  the  North's  merchant  marine,  a  still 
heavier  blow  was  struck.  In  all,  the  Confederates  had 
19  cruisers  at  sea,  and  they  captured  257  merchant- 
men. The  loss  of  these  ships,  however,  was  the  smallest 
part  of  the  injury  suffered.  The  possibility  of  capture 
deprived  American  ships  of  the  opportunity  to  obtain 
cargoes,  and  led  to  a  cessation  of  building  in    American 


THE   CRITICAL   PERIOD 


293 


shipyards.  It  led  many  owners  to  transfer  their  vessels 
to  foreign  flags.  It  changed  the  currents  of  commerce. 
Naturally  the  British  merchants  took  every  advantage  of 
their  opportunity,  as  the  Americans  had  done  in  the 
troubled  days  of  the  war  with  Napoleon. 

One  might  suppose  that  the  demand  for  naval  ships 
would  have  given  prosperity  to  the  shipyards  and  engine 
works,  but  John  Roach  testified  before  the  committee  men- 
tioned that  "out  of  ten  marine  engine  shops  that  were  in 
existence  in  New  York  at  the  commencement  of  the  war, 
his  was  the  only  one  remaining  in  existence." 

Though  iron  was  largely  used  in  the  government  ships, 
Nathaniel  McKay,  the  ship-builder,  told  this  committee 
that  "we  have  got  to  have  some  experience  in  building  iron 
ships.  We  have  built  but  few  iron  ships,  and  most  of  them 
were  failures." 

Mere  mention  only  of  the  transfer  of  American  capital 
from  the  sea  to  the  shore  need  be  made  here.  With  the 
depreciated  currency  there  was  plenty  of  opportunity  for 
"wildcat"  speculations;  for  government  contracts,  and  for 
other  kinds  of  investments  more  to  the  taste  of  honest  cap- 
italists. 

The  whole  seafaring  population  spent  the  war  period  in 
acquiring  new  habits,  while  the  British  ship-builders  were 
busy  perfecting  their  arts,  and  the  British  merchants  were 
establishing  themselves  firmly  in  the  trades  from  which  the 
war  drove  the  Americans. 

As  a  final  reason  for  the  decadence  of  the  American  mer- 


294     THE   STORY   OF   THE   MERCHANT  MARINE 

chant  marine,  note  that  the  conditions  of  life  in  the  Ameri- 
can forecastle  had  greatly  changed,  and  that  this  change 
began  when  the  American  ships  were  winning  their  laurels. 
With  the  advent  of  the  packet  system  the  "  private  venture" 
method  of  adding  to  a  sailor's  income  disappeared,  and 
with  it  one  strong  inducement  to  the  young  men  who 
thought  of  going  to  sea.  Then  the  old  custom  of  making 
the  forecastle  a  schoolroom,  with  the  ship's  officers  serving 
as  instructors  in  navigation,  died  out.  The  very  prosper- 
ity of  the  American  merchant  marine  served  to  deteriorate 
the  quality  of  American  seamen,  for  the  number  of  ships 
increased  much  more  rapidly  than  the  seafaring  population. 
Foreign  sailors  were  employed  for  lack  of  enough  Ameri- 
cans. In  time  even  the  number  of  experienced  foreigners 
was  insufficient.  Captain  J.  S.  Clark  testified  before  the 
committee  of  Congress  mentioned  above  that  he  had  taken 
a  ship  to  sea  with  "but  two  men  out  of  a  crew  of  sixty  who 
could  steer." 

With  the  employment  of  foreigners  the  pleasant  relations 
that  had  existed  between  the  forecastle  and  cabin  came  to 
an  end.  The  officers  who  had  been  shipmates  with  crews 
of  ambitious  young  Americans  found  the  foreign  sailors, 
with  their  lack  of  ambition  —  with  a  certain  slowness  of 
movement,  in  fact  —  exasperating,  especially  when  top- 
sails were  to  be  reefed  after  "carrying  on"  somewhat  too 
long !  This  exasperation,  with  race  or  national  prejudices  to 
increase  it,  was  what  led  to  the  use  of  the  belaying  pin  and 
the  pump-brake  for  the  "encouragement"  of  sailors  who 


THE   CRITICAL   PERIOD 


295 


failed  to  "show  willing."  Naturally,  as  time  passed,  the 
treatment  of  sailors  grew  worse,  and  an  American  statute 
which  required  the  sailor  to  prove  malice  or  revenge  on  the 
part  of  an  assailing  offtcer,  when  he  had  the  officer  arrested 
for  ill  treatment,  did  but  add  to  the  horrors  of  a  passage  on  a 
driven  ship,  Dana,  in  his  Two  Years  Before  the  Mast, 
describes  mildly  the  treatment  which  common  sailors  re- 
ceived in  American  ships  in  his  day.  Jewell's  Among 
Our  Sailors  describes  the  cruelty  more  in  detail.  It  was 
a  common  thing  for  captains  to  torture  men,  and  men 
were  sometimes  killed  by  the  brutality  which  they  could  not 
escape.  And  while  the  conditions  in  the  American  fore- 
castle were  growing  worse,  those  in  the  British  were  growing 
better.  In  1869  Captain  Cyrus  F.  Sargeant,  the  well- 
known  ship-owner,  testified  that  "the  wages  of  sailors  are 
lower  in  an  American  ship  than  in  an  English  ship."  It 
is  well  known  that  the  port  makes  the  wages  for  the  fore- 
castle, but  it  was  true,  then,  that  seamen  on  British  liners, 
at  least,  saved  more  money  in  a  year  than  the  men  on 
American  ships. 

The  testimony  taken  before  the  Merchant  Marine  Com- 
mission, in  1904  (p.  1263),  contains  the  following  paragraph, 
the  truthfulness  of  which  was  not  disputed :  — 

"The  condition  of  sea  life  under  the  American  flag  repels 
the  American,  boy  and  man.  These  conditions  are  mainly 
—  we  might  say  solely  —  due  to  the  state  of  the  naviga- 
tion laws  of  the  country.  These  laws  are  antiquated  and 
disgraceful,  compared  to  American  standards:   they  were 


296    THE   STORY   OF  THE   MERCHANT  MARINE 

designed  to  govern  slaves,  and  are  maintained  for  the  pur- 
pose of  making  slaves.  No  American  boy  with  any  spunk 
in  him  will  submit  himself  to  the  conditions  created  by  the 
maritime  law,  except  (as  frequently  happens)  as  the  alter- 
native of  a  term  in  prison.  Take  any  trade  that  now  at- 
tracts the  American  boy  and  now  holds  the  American  adult, 
apply  to  those  who  follow  it  a  special  code  of  laws  obnox- 
ious to  all  conceptions  of  Americanism,  repugnant  to  the 
dictates  of  humanity  and  condemned  by  the  instincts  of 
decency,  and  it  may  be  regarded  as  certain  that  that  trade 
would  speedily  be  shunned  by  American  labor.  And  if 
consulted  about  it  the  American  people  would  be  very  likely 
to  declare  that  if  such  laws  are  really  necessary  to  the 
continuance  of  the  trade  in  question,  it  would  be  a  mercy  to 
let  the  trade  die  in  order  to  be  rid  of  the  laws.  .  .  .  To 
create  a  healthy  popular  interest  in  the  whole  subject  of 
American  shipping  it  is  necessary  to  alter  the  laws  affect- 
ing American  seamen,  thus,  by  inducing  Americans  to  ac- 
cept service  at  sea,  creating  an  interest  in  the  vital  element 
of  the  subject,  and  also  by  reflex  action,  in  the  physical 
considerations  involved." 

This  matter  is  of  much  importance  here  because,  while 
life  at  sea  was  becoming  absolutely  unendurable,  by  a  self- 
respecting  American  youth,  —  in  an  American  ship,  that 
is,  —  the  opportunities  for  a  career  on  shore  were  becoming 
more  alluring.  The  young  men  who  might  have  become 
leaders  in  our  seafaring  population  —  who  might,  perhaps, 
have  found  a  way  to  maintain  our  supremacy  at  sea  — 


THE   CRITICAL   PERIOD  297 

were  forced  to  suppress  a  natural  liking  for  salt  water;  so 
they  took  the  farms  which  the  government  gave  away  too 
freely ;  or  they  raised  cattle  on  the  unfenced  plains;  or  they 
located  mines;  or  they  became  managers  and  owners  of 
factories  where  "protected"  goods  were  made;  or  they 
obtained  power  and  fortune  from  the  railroads.  While  the 
British  were  strengthening  their  hold  upon  the  sea,  the 
Americans  were  steadily  losing  the  sea  habit. 

It  is  manifest  from  any  candid  review  of  the  facts  that  the 
decadence  of  the  American  merchant  marine  was  wholly 
due  to  natural  causes  —  to  conditions  of  national  develop- 
ment (the  Civil  War  was  a  feature  of  our  national  develop- 
ment) that  were  unavoidable.  It  is  unpleasant,  but  abso- 
lutely necessary,  to  face  the  facts.  When  the  American 
merchant  marine  lost  the  command  of  the  sea  and  the 
British  gained  it,  the  result  was  due  to  the  working  of  the 
immutable  law  of  the  survival  of  the  fittest. 


CHAPTER   XVI 

DURING  A  HALF  CENTURY   OF   DEPRESSION 

IN  1866,  just  after  the  end  of  the  Civil  War,  the  Ameri- 
can steam  fleet  registered  for  foreign  trade,  measured 
198,289  tons.  The  steam  vessels  enrolled  for  coasting 
traffic  measured  885,223  tons.  In  1879  the  steam  tonnage 
in  the  foreign  trade  had  fallen  to  156,323,  while  the  coast- 
ing tonnage  had  passed  the  million  mark.  In  1896  the 
coasting  fleets  measured  more  than  2,000,000  tons,  while 
the  foreign  trade  ships  measured  264,289  tons.  In  1908 
the  coasting  steamers  reached  a  tonnage  of  4,055,295,  — 
double  the  figures  of  1896,  and  the  registered  tonnage  was 
598,737,  —  more  than  double  that  of  1896,  but  so  far  below 
that  of  the  coasting  tonnage  as  to  warrant  a  serious  in- 
quiry into  the  causes  which  had  created  the  contrast. 

Before  entering  into  this  inquiry,  however,  it  will  be  of 
interest  to  consider  several  features  of  the  growth  of  the 
coasting  traffic.  First  note  that  the  cheap  rates  of  trans- 
portation afforded  by  the  ships  running  from  such  Southern 
ports  as  Savannah,  Charleston,  and  Norfolk  to  Boston  and 
New  York  have  had  a  most  remarkable  influence  upon 
the  agriculture  of  the  Southern  coast  States.  Where  once 
cotton  only  was  raised,  or  cotton  and  tobacco,  the  land- 

298 


DURING  A   HALF   CENTURY   OF   DEPRESSION      299 

owners  are  producing  cargoes  of  vegetables  at  a  season 
when  such  truck  can  be  produced  at  the  North  only  by  the 
use  of  hothouses.  The  health  of  millions  of  people  at  the 
North,  and  the  prosperity  of  other  millions  at  the  South, 
have  been  greatly  promoted  by  the  coasting  steamers. 
At  the  same  time  the  coast  lines  of  railroads,  to  secure  a 
share  of  the  traffic  which  was  originated  by  steamers,  have 
improved  their  service  so  far  that  strawberries  and  string 
beans  have  right  of  way  over  passengers. 

A  natural  evolution  of  traffic  alongshore  has  been  seen  in 
the  extension,  so  to  speak,  of  the  railroads  across  both  salt 
and  fresh  water.  Soon  after  the  Boston  and  Providence 
Railroad  was  opened  (June  15,  1835),  its  directors  made 
an  agreement  with  a  line  of  steamers  to  New  York  under 
which  the  vessels  of  rival  lines  were  excluded  from  the  ter- 
minal facilities  of  the  railroad,  and  the  passengers  from  the 
rival  lines  had  to  wait  hours  for  a  train  on  which  to  continue 
their  journey.  In  1845  Daniel  Drew,  a  director  of  the 
Providence  and  Stonington  Railroad,  became  the  president 
of  the  line  of  steamers  running  from  Stonington  to  New 
York,  and  the  two  companies,  for  the  purposes  of  traffic, 
were  operated  as  one. 

The  railroads  that  terminated  on  the  shores  of  Lake 
Erie  engaged  in  the  Lake  traffic  at  an  early  date  by  establish- 
ing ship  lines  that  gathered  freight  at  all  Lake  ports  of  im- 
portance for  transportation  to  the  East,  and,  of  course, 
carried  the  traffic  from  the  East  to  the  farthest  points 
on  the  Lakes,     These  steamers  had  a  marked  influence  on 


300 


THE   STORY   OF   THE   MERCHANT  MARINE 


the  development  of  the  West.  Of  such  lines  as  that  which 
runs  from  Galveston  and  New  Orleans  to  New  York  in 
connection  with  the  Southern  Pacific  Railroad,  only  men- 
tion need  be  made,  but  the  fact  that  the  extension  of  rail- 
roads in  this  way  across  wide  stretches  of  the  waters  of  the 
country,  has  had  a  marked  influence  upon  the  prosperity 
of  the  country  as  well  as  upon  that  of  the  railroads,  is 
memorable. 

Another  notable  feature  of  the  coasting  trade  is  a  revival 
of  the  old  system,  practised  by  such  merchants  as  Derby, 
of  Salem,  when  they  built  ships  especially  to  carry  their  own 
goods  to  market.  Thus,  when  petroleum  was  found  in 
Texas,  the  Standard  Oil  Company  built  many  vessels  to 
carry  the  crude  oil  from  the  wtIIs  to  the  refineries  at  New 
York.  The  oil  was  taken  through  pipes  from  the  wells  to 
the  ship,  and  it  was  pumped  from  the  ship  into  tanks  at  the 
refineries.  With  the  aid  of  such  port  facilities  the  cost  of 
transportation  was  reduced  to  the  lowest  figure. 

The  United  States  Steel  Corporation,  owning  ore  beds  near 
Lake  Superior  and  mills  near  Pittsburg,  built  a  fleet  of 
ships  to  carry  the  ore  to  points  on  Lake  Erie  whence  it  could 
be  shipped  on  a  private  railroad  to  the  mills.  The  ore  in 
the  beds  was  scooped  up  with  steam  shovels  and  dumped 
into  cars,  by  which  it  was  transported  to  high  trestles  on  the 
edge  of  the  harbor.  On  the  trestles  it  was  dumped  into 
pockets,  from  which  it  fell  through  chutes  into  the  vessel, 
the  hatches  of  which  were  spaced  to  correspond  with  the 
spaces  of  the  chutes.     A  cargo  of  more  than  10,000  tons 


DURING   A   HALF   CENTURY   OF   DEPRESSION      301 

has  been  loaded  in  two  hours.  At  the  port  of  discharge 
other  scoops  (a  sort  of  dredge),  made  to  operate  through 
the  hatches,  lift  the  cargo  out  of  the  ship  at  a  rate  of  more 
than  a  thousand  tons  an  hour. 

The  great  coal  companies  of  the  East  deliver  their  coal 
in  similar  pockets  on  the  coast,  but  they  transport  a  large 
portion  of  it  thence  to  the  consumer  by  means  of  tugs  and 
barges.  In  proportion  to  the  coal  carried,  the  tug-and- 
barge  system  costs  less  than  cargo-carrying  steamers.  The 
tugs,  with  their  high-priced  crews,  are  kept  moving;  they 
tow  the  barges  in  "strings"  to  their  destinations,  dropping 
one  here  and  another  there,  until  the  last  is  at  the  pier. 
Then  they  return,  picking  up  the  barges  that  have  been  un- 
loaded, and  take  them  to  the  pockets  for  more  coal.  The 
barges  have  small  crews  of  low-priced  men.  The  expense  of 
waiting  for  the  discharge  of  the  coal  is  therefore  less  than 
if  a  steamer  had  carried  the  coal;  it  is  even  less  than  the 
expense  of  a  schooner  lying  thus.  The  systems  of  hand- 
ling cargoes  in  coarse  freight  trades  of  the  American  coast 
are,  perhaps,  the  most  perfect  in  the  world. 

Naturally,  extensions  of  the  railroad  lines  have  been 
made  across  deep  water.  The  Pennsylvania  Railroad  es- 
tablished the  American  line  from  Philadelphia  to  Liverpool 
in  1 87 1.  The  Baltimore  and  Ohio  established  the  At- 
lantic Transport  line  to  Europe.  The  Louisville  and  Nash- 
ville created  lines  from  Pensacola  to  several  countries,  in- 
cluding Japan  and  China.  The  Illinois  Central  has  lines 
from  New  Orleans.     The  Occidental  and  Oriental  Steam- 


302     THE   STORY   OF  THE   MERCHANT  MARINE 

ship  Company  was  organized  to  carry  the  freight  of  the 
Pacific  railroads  from  San  Francisco  to  the  Far  East. 
Near  the  end  of  the  nineteenth  century  the  Southern  Pa- 
cific Railroad  bought  an  interest  in  the  Pacific  Mail.  The 
Northern  Pacific  was  served  for  years  by  the  Boston  Steam- 
ship Company,  and  the  Great  Northern  Railroad  built  two 
of  the  largest  cargo  carriers  in  the  world  for  an  extension  of 
service  across  the  Pacific.  Most  of  the  ships  in  these  ex- 
tensions of  railroads  have  been  of  American  build. 

In  oversea  traffic  the  through  bills  of  lading  and  special 
terminal  facilities  gave  the  ships  owned  by  railroads  special 
advantages  in  the  world's  traffic.  A  great  corporation  is 
able  to  purchase  supplies  at  the  lowest  prices.  Further 
than  that,  it  is  not  infrequently  advisable  to  carry  freight 
on  ships  at  an  actual  loss  in  order  to  provide  freight  for  the 
cars  in  which  it  can  be  carried  with  profit. 

Another  American  adventure  at  sea  that  is  of  interest 
here  was  the  evolution  of  the  United  Fruit  Company.  In- 
dividual dealers  in  perishable  products  of  the  tropics  found 
it  profitable  to  unite  in  gathering  bananas  and  other  fruits, 
and  in  chartering  ships  to  bring  them  to  the  United  States. 
As  the  business  continued  to  increase,  the  need  of  swift 
ships,  and  for  fittings  to  preserve  the  fruit  in  the  best  con- 
dition, led  to  the  building  of  special  kinds  of  ships  (chiefly 
under  foreign  flags)  and  of  machinery  for  loading  and  un- 
loading the  cargoes  at  the  terminals.  In  the  meantime,  the 
speedy  ships  employed  had  proved  attractive  to  passen- 
gers, and  because  passengers  could  be  carried  without 


DURING   A   HALF   CENTURY   OF   DEPRESSION 


3°3 


decreasing  the  efficiency  of  the  ships  as  fruit  carriers,  efforts 
were  made  to  increase  this  branch  of  the  traffic.  In  time 
the  company  built  hotels  for  the  comfort  of  the  passen- 
gers at  points  in  the  tropics  where  a  comfortable  hotel  was 
a  surprise  to  the  experienced  traveller.  Then  because  the 
well-contented  fruit  farmers  of  the  tropics  were  unwilling 
to  keep  up  with  the  demands  of  the  trade  in  either  the 
quantity  or  the  quality  of  the  fruit,  the  company  bought 
land  and  produced  the  cargoes  needed  by  their  ships. 

The  Standard  Oil  Company  employs  nearly  a  hundred 
ships  (chiefly  under  foreign  flags),  which  it  has  built  for 
the  purpose,  to  transport  its  products  to  foreign  countries. 
And  there  are  other  corporations  that  own  ships  as  parts 
of  their  business  equipment. 

These  American  enterprises  are  of  the  utmost  impor- 
tance to  the  story  of  the  American  merchant  marine,  be- 
cause they  are  the  most  modern  features  of  our  water-borne 
traffic.  The  great  corporation  is  doing  an  ever  growing 
share  of  the  world's  work,  and  the  growth  is  an  economic 
evolution  that  must  be  forwarded  as  well  as  controlled. 
In  spite  of  the  prevailing  fear  of  great  aggregations  of 
wealth,  it  is  worth  while  to  inquire  whether  a  further  com- 
bination of  corporate  interests  might  not  help  on  a  revival 
of  the  American  merchant  marine.  Suppose  that  a  ship- 
building "trust"  were  united  with  the  steel-making  "trust" 
and  the  aggregation  were  to  make  a  traffic  agreement  with 
a  combination  of  railroads  extending  from  the  Atlantic 
to  the  Pacific,  under  which  special  low  freight  rates  were 


304     THE   STORY  OF   THE   MERCHANT  MARINE 

obtainable ;  is  it  not  conceivable  that  this  powerful  corpo- 
ration might  solve  the  problem  of  ships  able  to  compete  on 
deep  water  ?  Although  the  law  now  prohibits  such  com- 
binations as  this,  may  we  not  hope  that  the  American 
people  will  yet  learn  how  to  preserve  themselves  from 
oppression,  and  the  fear  of  it,  without  hampering  the 
men  who  are  able  and  eager  to  do  the  world's  work  on 
the  world's  terms? 

In  any  consideration  of  a  revival  of  the  American  mer- 
chant marine,  it  is  necessary  to  view  candidly  the  conditions 
which  our  ships  must  face.  Emphasis  is  laid  upon  the  need 
of  candor,  because  in  such  discussions  of  the  matter  as  have 
been  had  in  periodicals,  and  before  committees  of  Con- 
gress, the  plainest  facts  of  history  have  been  frequently 
misstated,  and,  at  times,  deliberately  misrepresented.  If 
one-half  the  ingenuity  and  energy  that  have  been  used  in 
arguing  for  the  subsidy  policy  had  been  expended  in  evolv- 
ing a  revolution-making  type  of  ship,  we  should  have  had, 
long  since,  a  merchant  marine  worthy  of  the  flag.  Further 
than  that,  while  an  appeal  to  sentiment  is  justified,  the 
matter  ought  to  be  viewed  first  as  a  cold  matter  of  business. 

Is  the  deep-water  carrying  trade  worth  the  attention  of 
American  capitalists?  It  is  a  curious  fact  that  in  the 
hearings  before  the  committees  of  Congress  that  have  in- 
vestigated the  state  of  our  shipping  since  the  Civil  War, 
not  one  word  has  been  said  about  the  dividends  paid  by 
the  ocean  carriers  of  the  world.  The  reports  of  the  com- 
mittees assume  that  there  is  great  profit  in  such  shipping. 


DURING   A   HALF   CENTURY   OF   DEPRESSION      305 

One  adroit  advocate  of  the  subsidy  system  says  "the 
European  steamship  combinations  .  .  .  now  derive  an 
income  of  about  $200,000,000  a  year  from  their  control 
of  our  carrying  trade"  {Atlantic Monthly,  October,  1909), 
leaving  the  reader  to  suppose  that  that  great  sum  is  divided 
as  net  profits. 

As  a  matter  of  fact,  the  International  Mercantile  Marine 
Company,  one  of  the  larger  corporations  thus  engaged 
(it  is  largely  in  the  hands  of  American  capitalists,  too), 
has  paid  no  dividends  as  yet  (1909),  and  even  its  bonds 
sell  below  par.  When  the  Cunard  Company  wished  to 
build  two  ships  to  excel  the  swiftest  of  the  German  liners, 
it  was  unable  to  do  so  until  the  British  government  loaned 
it  the  necessary  capital  under  conditions  that  amounted 
to  a  gift  of  the  total  cost  of  the  ships.  According  to  the 
Financial  Times  (London),  dated  Wednesday,  April  14, 
1909,  the  highest  dividend  paid  by  this  most  highly  favored 
of  all  the  British  subsidized  lines  during  the  last  fourteen 
years  (1895-1908)  was  8  per  cent,  which  was  distributed 
in  1900.  The  average  distribution  for  the  fourteen  years 
has  been  3.17  per  cent  a  year.  In  1895,  instead  of  making 
a  profit,  the  company  lost  ;^4o,ooo.  In  1 904  there  was  a  loss 
of  ;^66,7oo.  In  1908,  while  operating  the  two  splendid 
and  thoroughly  well-advertised  record  breakers  which 
it  had  received  as  a  free  gift  from  the  British  government 
(the  Maiiretania  and  Liisitania),  it  made  the  enormous 
loss  of  ;^249,8oo.  A  letter  from  the  company  to  the  writer 
admits  that  these  figures  are  correct. 

X 


3o6     THE   STORY   OF   THE   MERCHANT  MARINE 

Said  James  A,  Patton,  then  one  of  the  foremost  grain 
exporters  of  the  United  States,  in  a  hearing  before  the 
Merchant  Marine  Commission  of  Congress  in  1904  (Sen. 
Rep.  2755,  58  Cong.  3  sess.  p.  714):  — 

"  The  ocean  freight  market  has  been  so  low  during  the 
past  two  years  that  at  times  the  ship  agents  have  offered 
to  transport  grain  to  Liverpool  and  London  for  nothing, 
to  take  it  as  ballast.  Recently  we  have  shipped  corn  from 
Boston  to  London  at  a  price  less  than  that  .  .  .  less  than 
nothing,  owing  to  duties  the  port  dues  in  London,  which 
absorbed  more  than  the  freight  rate  received." 

The  conditions  described  by  Mr.  Patton  are  out  of  the 
ordinary,  of  course,  but  conditions  which  have  kept  the 
dividends  of  the  well-subsidized  Cunard  Company  under 
3  per  cent  have  prevailed  for  thirteen  years.  The  com- 
pany was  able  to  earn  the  8  per  cent  dividend  in  1900  only 
because  the  war  with  the  Boers  created  an  extraordinary 
demand  for  ships  to  be  used  as  transports,  and  these  having 
been  taken  from  the  general  carrying-trade  freight  rates 
rose  to  an  abnormal  point.  Leaving  out  the  abnormal 
dividend  of  1900,  the  average  distribution  has  been  but 
2.8  per  cent. 

The  ocean  carrying-trade  is  performed  by  two  distinct 
classes  of  services  ;  the  line  traffic,  like  that  of  the  Cunard 
Company,  and  the  independent  cargo  carrier  or  tramp  ser- 
vice. The  tramp  will  go  anywhere  and  at  any  time  for  a 
charter  price.  The  income  received  by  the  tramps  is  as 
uncertain  as  that  of  a  prospector  in  the  mining  region. 


DURING   A   HALF   CENTURY   OF  DEPRESSION      307 

In  spite  of  the  ease  with  which  the  demand  for  tonnage  is 
telegraphed  around  the  world  the  tramps  accumulate  on 
this  or  that  coast  in  numbers  far  beyond  all  needs  of  the 
trade,  and  rates  drop  to  a  point  where  many  of  them  are 
glad  to  get  away  in  ballast.  At  such  a  time,  however,  a 
lucky  (perhaps  a  far-seeing)  owner  has  a  ship  at  a  port 
barren  of  tonnage,  and  receives  for  a  cargo  that  must  go 
quickly  a  price  that  pays  half  the  cost  of  the  ship.  It  is 
the  lucky  stroke  that  keeps  the  seafaring  people  hoping 
against  hope,  just  as  the  prospector  remembers  how 
Creede,  of  Colorado,  made  a  million  out  of  the  Amethyst. 
Then  consider  the  effect  of  the  tides  in  the  business 
world  upon  the  carrying-trade.  After  the  war  with  the 
Boers  the  freight  rates  went  to  pieces.  Owners  ceased 
building  new  tonnage.  The  ship-builders,  to  keep  their 
forces  together,  offered  to  construct  the  best  of  modern 
vessels  at  cost  of  construction.  Thereupon  new  capital 
came  into  the  trade,  and  some  men  of  experience  also 
placed  orders.  In  this  way  an  excess  of  tonnage  was  kept 
afloat.  Meantime  much  old  tonnage  in  the  progressive 
countries  like  England  and  Germany  was  placed  on  the 
market  at  forced  sale,  and  these  ships  were  bought  by 
continental  owners  who  patched  them  up  ("cheap  re- 
pairs for  the  cheap  ones"),  and  sent  them,  with  cheap 
crews,  looking  for  cargoes.  It  must  be  kept  in  mind  that 
Chinese  owners,  who  can  hire  stokers  at  $6  a  month,  are 
competing  in  the  world's  traffic,  as  well  as  owners  who  have 
to  pay  $40  a  month  for  the  same  kind  of  work.     \\'herc 


3o8     THE   STORY   OF   THE   MERCHANT   MARINE 

the  Chinese  owner  can  make  money,  and  the  owner  of  the 
best  of  modern  freighters  can  hvc,  and  even  make  a  lucky 
stroke,  now  and  then,  the  owner  of  the  average  tramp  keeps 
her  running  because  the  losses  while  she  is  in  commission 
are  less  than  when  she  is  laid  up  in  ordinary.  The  tramp 
traffic  is  precisely  like  mining  in  that  the  luck  of  the  few 
keeps  the  many  trying.  Moreover  the  trend  of  business 
has  been,  for  some  time,  away  from  tramps  and  into  reg- 
ular line  ships,  and  that  is  a  fact  worth  serious  con- 
sideration. 

The  average  profit  of  the  lines  of  steamers  is  well  set 
forth  in  the  statement  of  the  Cunard  Company,  unless, 
indeed,  that  statement  is  more  favorable  than  the  average 
facts  warrant.  The  Hamburg-American  Line  dividends 
during  the  past  fourteen  years  have  averaged  5!  per  cent 
per  annum,  and  it  is  likely  that  but  one  other  ship-own- 
ing corporation  has  done  as  well  on  deep  water.  It  is  a 
world's  traffic  even  for  a  line  that  plies  between  New  York 
and  Liverpool  only.  The  price  that  a  Swedish  tramp  will 
accept  for  wheat  in  the  River  Plate,  and  the  rate  which  the 
Japanese  will  accept  on  the  coast  of  China,  both  affect  the 
North  German  Lloyd  at  Bremen.  A  few  lines,  especially 
those  having  special  trades,  make  good  dividends.  The 
United  Fruit  Company's  ships  are  among  the  exceptions 
because  of  the  peculiarities  of  the  business.  But  every 
ship-owner  knows  that  on  the  average  there  is  no  great  part 
of  the  world's  work  that  pays  smaller  dividends  than  carry- 
ing cargoes  across  deep  water. 


DURING   A   HALF   CENTURY   OF  DEPRESSION      309 

The  people  of  the  United  States,  before  taxing  them- 
selves to  add  to  the  congestion  upon  the  high  seas,  should 
ask  themselves  whether  success,  when  attained,  will  be 
worth  the  cost.  Would  a  sensible  American  farmer, 
able  to  earn  $3  a  day  grafting  orchards,  work  overtime 
in  order  to  compete  with  a  foreign  ditch  digger  receiving 
$1.50? 

If  we  decide  to  make  the  fight  for  a  share  of  the  business 
of  the  sea  it  will  then  be  of  the  utmost  importance  to  con- 
sider the  strength  of  the  opposition  to  be  overcome.  In 
this  inquiry  no  account  will  be  taken  of  ships  of  the  sail. 
For  while  schooners  fit  to  carry  from  3000  up  to  perhaps 
10,000  tons'  dead  weight  came  into  use  in  the  coast  coal 
trade  at  the  end  of  the  nineteenth  century,  and  proved 
profitable,  it  is  absurd  to  think  of  any  kind  of  sailing 
ship  in  connection  with  future  traffic  on  deep  water. 

According  to  the  last  Report  of  the  Commissioner  of 
Navigation  (1908),  the  United  Kingdom  had,  in  1907, 
4105  steamships,  measuring  9,156,356  tons,  with  crews 
aggregating  185,867  men  (this  "includes  masters  as  well 
as  Asiatics  and  Lascars"),  in  the  foreign  trade,  besides 
239  ships  of  240,983  tons,  manned  by  5362  men,  engaged 
partly  in  the  home,  and  partly  in  the  foreign,  trade.  The 
tonnage  of  1907  was  about  four  times  as  great  as  it  was 
in  1880. 

The  German  Empire  had,  in  1908,  2521  steamships, 
of  4,070,242  tons,  manned  by  65,568  men.  This  tonnage 
was  twice  as  large  as  the  tonnage  of  1900. 


3IO     THE   STORY   OF   THE    MERCHANT   MARINE 

In  1908  the  Japanese  had  626  steamships  of  1,076,070 
tons,  which  was  twice  the  tonnage  registered  in  1900.  The 
number  of  men  in  the  fleet  is  not  given,  but  it  was  at  least 
16,000. 

The  steamships  of  the  world,  exclusive  of  those  of  the 
United  States,  measured,  in  1906,  more  than  30,000,000 
tons.  Perhaps  800,000  men  were  employed  on  these 
ships,  and  there  was  an  experienced  force  of  owners  and 
managers  on  shore  to  look  after  the  interests  of  the  fleet. 

The  quality  of  this  vast  sea  power  must  now  be  consid- 
ered. In  this  point  of  view  it  is  a  most  discouraging  fact 
that  about  all  important  improvements  of  recent  years  in  the 
steam  engine  have  been  made  by  Europeans.  Between  1855 
and  1865  steam  pressures  in  boilers  ranged  from  20  to 
35  pounds  per  square  inch,  and  the  consumption  of  fuel 
was  about  3  pounds  per  horse-power-hour.  Compound 
engines  came  into  general  use  between  1865  and  1875, 
when  boiler  pressures  rose  to  125  pounds,  and  the  con- 
sumption of  fuel  decreased  to  2.2  pounds  and  even  less. 
Between  1885  and  1895  t^^^'^  screws  and  quadruple  ex- 
pansion engines  were  adopted  for  the  swiftest  ships,  and 
the  improved  engines  were  used  on  many  cargo  carriers. 
Boiler  pressures  reached  225  pounds  and  upward,  and 
the  coal  consumption  dropped  as  low  as  1.4  pounds. 
Then  came  the  far-reaching  change  to  the  steam  turbine, 
on  ships  of  14  knots  and  upward.  For  slower  ships  the 
turbine  in  combination  with  reciprocating  engines  has 
been  found  more  efficient  than  the  old-style  engines,  while 


DURING   A   HALF   CExNTURY   OF   DEPRESSION 


311 


a  combination  of  the  turbine  with  the  dynamo  for  still 
slower  ships  is  now  in  hand  and  sure  to  make  headway. 
In  all  these  matters  Europe  has  taken  the  lead. 

In  the  turbine,  with  its  combinations,  it  is  believed  that 
the  steam-engine  reaches  its  highest  possible  efficiency, 
just  as  sails  reached  their  highest  efficiency  as  used  on  the 
American  clipper.  But  a  new  machine,  still  more  eco- 
nomical, has  been  invented — the  gas  motor.  Coal  is  used 
for  the  generation  of  gas,  which  drives  internal-combustion 
motors,  much  like  those  seen  on  automobiles.  The  con- 
sumption of  fuel  is  thereby  reduced  far  below  that  of  steam 
engines. 

While  the  marine  steam-engine  has  been  perfected  in 
Europe,  it  is  worth  noting  by  the  way  that  the  producer- 
gas  engine,  though  yet  in  the  experimental  stage  for  ship 
use,  has  been  brought  to  a  higher  state  of  perfection  for 
land  use  in  America  than  in  Europe.  Magazine  articles 
by  marine  engineers  have  been  published,  urging  American 
ship-owners  to  adopt  this  new  method  of  propulsion, 
because  it  is  to  make  a  revolution  almost  as  far-reaching 
as  the  iron  screw  steamer  made  in  1855.  But  the  American 
ship-owner  refuses  to  see  his  opportunity.  Having  certain 
profits  with  old-style  engines  in  the  coasting  trade,  he  is 
willing  to  let  foreigners  do  the  experimenting. 

All  of  this  is  to  say  that  the  ship-owners  of  foreign 
countries  are  at  least  as  far-sighted  and  enterprising  as 
those  of  the  United  States, 

Some  of  the  facts  in  the  story  of  our  coasting  steamer 


312     THE   STORY   OF   THE   MERCHANT  MARINE 

trade  are  of  interest  in  this  point  of  view.  The  most 
interesting  division  of  this  fleet  is  found  upon  the  Great 
Lakes.  The  screw  propeller  and  the  compound  engine 
were  successfully  introduced  on  the  Great  Lakes  before 
1850  —  several  years  before  the  iron  screw  steamer  of 
the  British  began  its  deadly  inroads  upon  our  salt-water 
trade  —  but    the    Atlantic    coast    remained    indifferent. 

After  the  Civil  War  tugs  came  into  use  for  towing  the 
sailing  vessels  through  the  Detroit  and  Huron  rivers, 
and  from  these  the  use  of  barges  in  "strings"  behind 
steamers  that  carried  cargoes  as  well  as  served  as  tugs, 
was  developed.  This  system  ruled  upon  the  lakes  until 
the  evolution  of  the  iron  ore  trade  led  to  the  building  of 
ships  so  large  that  they  were  unable  to  handle  barges.  In 
1902  the  ship  able  to  carry  10,000  tons  arrived. 

Still  larger  ships  have  been  built  since  1902.  A  ship 
that  can  carry  12,000  tons'  dead  weight  needs  but  thirty-five 
men,  all  told.  The  average  cost  of  carrying  freight  on  the 
best  ships  of  the  lakes  is  less  than  .8  of  a  mill  per  ton-mile. 
Through  natural  development  this  splendid  efficiency  has 
been  attained,  and  the  fleet  in  1908  numbered  1942  ships 
measuring  2,341,686  tons. 

A  feature  of  these  ships  to  be  considered  is  that  they  are 
all  built  for  passing  through  certain  shoal  channels,  the 
Welland  Canal,  and  the  canal  at  the  rapids  at  the  outlet  of 
Lake  Superior,  for  example.  These  channels  have  com- 
pelled the  designers  to  adopt  one  cross-section  of  hull  for 
all  ships  (at  least  below  the  water-line),  and  that  cross- 


.•■} 


.,:■'! 


'MM 


I  I 


DURING   A   HALF  CENTURY   OF  DEPRESSION      313 

section  is  the  largest  that  will  pass  through  the  channels. 
Because  of  this  similarity  of  models  the  lake  builders  have 
been  able  to  carry  specialization  in  the  work  of  construction 
as  far  as  any  builders  in  the  world,  and  much  further  than 
it  is  carried  in  the  Atlantic  coast  yards,  where  builders  may 
have  a  battleship,  a  harbor  tug,  and  a  side-wheel  passenger 
boat  on  adjoining  ways.  The  lake  ships  can  be  built  for 
the  lowest  price  of  any  in  the  United  States. 

Contemplation  of  these  facts,  and  upon  the  further 
fact  that  lake  engineers  seemed  to  be  about  the  best  the 
world  had  ever  seen,  led  the  lake  capitalists  to  organize 
the  American  Navigation  Company,  which  built  two  large 
cargo  carriers,  sent  them  down  to  salt  water,  and  entered 
the  general  cargo  trade.  Those  vessels  were  among  the 
most  economical  ever  built  in  the  United  States,  all  things 
considered,  hut  they  were  unable  to  compete  with  the  Euro- 
pean ship. 

A  story  told  by  A.  B.  Wolvin  to  the  Merchant  Marine 
Commission  is  significant  here.  A  company  of  which 
he  was  president  operated  a  line  of  steamers  from  Duluth 
and  Chicago  to  Montreal  and  Quebec.  The  steamers 
numbered  ten  of  the  maximum  size  for  passage  through 
the  Welland  Canal  —  250  by  42  feet  large,  with  a  draft 
of  fourteen  feet,  and  a  carrying  capacity  of  2200  tons. 
The  cost  of  these  ships,  built  under  the  best  American 
conditions  of  specialization,  was  $140,000  each,  and  the 
operating  expense  was  $135  a  day  each.  While  the  com- 
pany was  engaged  in  its  work,  a  steamship  man   from 


314 


THE   STORY   OF   THE   MERCHANT  MARINE 


Sweden  came  and  offered  to  put  on  twelve  ships  of  the 
same  size,  each  at  a  charter  price  of  $2900  per  month. 
His  ships  cost  but  $90,000  each,  and  the  wages  of  crew 
and  other  operating  expenses  were  so  much  lower  than 
the  American  standard  that  he  could  make  money  at  a 
charter  price  of  $1000  a  month  less  than  the  cost  of  operat- 
ing the  American  ships.  Having  used  these  Swedish 
ships  long  enough  to  know  them  (for  it  was  necessary  to 
accept  the  offer  to  keep  the  Swede  from  starting  in  oppo- 
sition). Captain  Wolvin  testified :  — 

''They  are  better  from  the  standpoint  of  construction. 
.  .  .  The  vessels  carry  well;  they  run  well.  We  have 
no  trouble  with  the  crews." 

The  crew  of  the  Swedish  ship  numbered  seventeen; 
that  of  the  American,  twenty-two.  And  the  Swedish  wage 
was  far  less. 

The  bearing  of  these  facts  in  any  consideration  of  the 
power  of  the  ship-owners  who  are  now  in  control  of  the 
deep  water  traffic  of  the  world  is  obvious. 

Other  views  of  the  world's  carrying  trade  are  of  interest 
here.  The  Hamburg-American  Company  runs  steam- 
ships in  sixty-eight  different  lines.  There  is  a  line  of  its 
ships  from  Europe  to  each  port  of  importance  from  Mon- 
treal to  Newport  News.  It  maintains  other  lines  to  the 
important  ports  of  the  West  Indies,  to  Ports  Limon  and 
Colon  on  the  narrow  mainland,  and  to  every  important 
port  on  the  north,  the  east,  and  the  west  coasts  of  South 
America.     It  reaches  nearly  every  port  of  importance  on 


DURING   A  HALF   CENTURY  OF  DEPRESSION 


315 


the  coasts  of  Europe,  and  down  the  west  coast  of  Africa. 
Indeed,  on  the  west  coast  of  Africa  the  natives  see  two 
German  steamers  to  one  under  the  British  flag.  It  sends 
other  ships  through  the  Suez  Canal  to  skirt  the  coast  of 
Asia  as  far  as  Vladivostok;  it  maintains  cargo  gatherers 
among  the  islands  along  shore,  and  then,  from  Japan,  it 
reaches  across  to  Portland,  Oregon,  where  it  connects 
with  our  Northern  Pacific  Railroad.  It  runs  every  kind 
of  ship  from  the  23-knot  passenger  packet  to  the  economi- 
cal cargo  carrier  that  uses  perhaps  little  more  than  ten 
tons  of  coal  a  day.  The  traffic  of  the  world  is,  in  a  way, 
within  the  touch  of  this  one  corporation.  The  world- 
wide tides  of  commerce  are  felt  and  noted  daily  in  the 
home  office,  and  while  losses  are  suffered,  here  and  there, 
through  depressions  in  business,  or  through  competition, 
the  profit  made  by  the  vast  fleet  as  a  whole  is  sufficient 
to  yield  regularly  the  modest  dividends  that  satisfy  the 
owners. 

The  fact  that  the  powerful  North  German  Lloyd  is 
allied  with  the  Hamburg-American  in  all  matters  that 
affect  German  commerce  and  trade  is  also  a  matter  of 
interest  in  this  place. 

To  show  now  how  an  effort  to  force  a  new  company 
into  an  established  trade  affects  freight  rates,  it  is  necessary 
only  to  refer  to  such  an  instance  as  the  "war"  that  pre- 
vailed in  the  trade  from  New  York  to  South  Africa  in 
1902.  As  Smith  notes  in  The  Ocean  Carrier,  the  rival 
steamships  lost  from  $10,000  to  $15,000  on  every  trip. 


3i6     THE   STORY   OF   THE   MERCHANT   MARINE 

Moreover,  the  low  rates  were  of  no  advantage  to  commerce, 
for  commerce  demands  stability  first  of  all.  It  is  worth 
noting,  too,  by  the  way,  that  in  the  course  of  this  war, 
goods  were  carried  by  English  steamers  from  New  York 
to  Africa  for  less  than  was  charged  by  the  same  companies 
on  ships  from  London  to  the  same  destination. 

When  American  capitalists  tried  to  establish  a  line  of 
ships  from  New  York  to  Brazil  some  years  ago,  the  venture 
failed.  One  reason  for  this  was  the  higher  cost  of  American 
ships  and  crews.  Another  was  extravagance,  especially 
in  providing  terminal  facilities  at  Rio  de  Janeiro.  Old 
merchants  in  Brazil  still  smile  when  they  talk  of  what  the 
American  line  did  in  that  way.  But  the  most  important 
reason  for  failure  was  the  advantage  enjoyed  by  British 
rivals  in  the  triangular  line  route  followed  by  their  steamers. 
In  the  currents  of  commerce  on  the  Atlantic  the  British 
manufacturer  ships  large  quantities  of  goods  to  South 
America,  the  South  American  producer  ships  large  quanti- 
ties of  coffee  to  the  United  States,  and  the  American  pro- 
ducer ships  large  quantities  of  food-stuffs  to  Great  Britain. 
The  British  ships  had  profitable  cargoes  from  home  to  Brazil. 
At  Rio  de  Janeiro  and  Santos  they  cut  the  rates  far  below 
cost,  and  then  on  arrival  in  the  United  States  they  secured 
cargoes  for  home  at  a  profitable  rate.  The  profits  on 
the  two  trips  enabled  them  to  endure  the  cut  on  the  middle 
passage.  But  because  American  manufacturers  had  little 
to  ship  to  Brazil  the  American  ship  lost  money  on  both 
passages. 


DURING  A  HALF  CENTURY  OF  DEPRESSION      317 

Every  business  man  understands  the  advantages  of 
one  who  is  well-established  in  any  trade,  over  one  who 
is  just  beginning,  but  one  method  by  which  established 
lines  of  ships  hold  their  trade  must  have  mention.  The 
merchant  who  sends  all  his  goods  by  the  established  line 
receives  a  rebate  of  10  per  cent  on  the  amount  of  his 
freight  bill,  the  rebate  being  calculated  once  in  six 
months,  say,  and  the  payment  being  made  six  months 
later.  If  the  merchant  ships  an  ounce  of  stuff  by  a  rival 
line  he  loses  all  the  rebate,  and  he  may  be  punished  in 
addition,  if  the  rival  is  a  new  line.  The  merchant,  having 
rivals  in  trade,  feels  the  loss  of  the  rebate  seriously;  his 
rivals  by  loyalty  to  the  established  line  continue  to  enjoy 
the  rebate  even  when  rates  are  cut  below  those  of  the  new 
line,  and  below  cost.  In  such  trades  as  that  between 
New  York  and  Rio  de  Janeiro,  where  a  number  of  lines 
are  plying,  the  established  lines  unite  their  entire  resources 
to  kill  off  a  new  line  trying  to  enter  the  trade. 

When  the  American  people  have  before  them  any  propo- 
sition for  the  revival  of  the  American  merchant  marine, 
they  should  keep  in  mind  that  ships  designed  for  the 
purpose  and  at  least  in  sufficient  numbers,  are  afloat  in 
every  trade  of  the  world ;  that  the  freight  rates  are  main- 
tained at  a  point  where  the  profits  are  as  low  as  any 
afforded  by  any  branch  of  the  world's  work;  that  the  men 
doing  the  work  have  been  developed  with  the  steam 
carrying  trade,  just  as  the  splendid  American  sailor  of  the 
sail  was  developed  by  his  environment,  and  they  are  there- 


3i8     THE   STORY   OF   THE   MERCHANT   MARINE 

fore  at  once  well-informed,  alert,  enterprising,  resourceful, 
persistent,  and  merciless.  Observe,  too,  that  in  the  work 
of  the  high  seas  man  faces  primeval  conditions,  brute  force 
prevails  as  nowhere  else,  and  the  fittest  survives. 

Perhaps  a  definition  of  terms  is  needed  here.  By  fitness 
we  mean  the  ability  to  do  the  world's  work  on  the  terms 
which  the  world  offers.  We  have  learned  to  build  bridges 
and  locomotives  on  those  terms,  but,  in  spite  of  the  fact 
that  our  ship-builders  and  ship-owners  are  fully  protected 
in  the  "home  market,"  they  have  not  yet  learned  how  to 
combine  the  locomotive  and  the  bridge  into  a  ship  fit  to 
compete  with  the  unsubsidized  ships  —  the  cargo  carriers 
—  now  in  the  world's  traffic. 

In  connection  with  the  known  degree  of  efficiency  of 
the  world's  merchant  marine,  as  now  afloat,  consider 
a  statement  that  can  be  found  on  page  1248  of  the  Report 
of  the  Merchant  Marine  Commission.  It  is,  perhaps,  the 
most  discouraging  statement  that  has  been  made  in  con- 
nection with  our  merchant  marine. 

"The  statistics  of  loss  of  ships  at  sea  afford  matter  for 
reflection.  .  .  .  They  show,  as  the  United  States  Com- 
missioner of  Navigation  has  summarized  them,  that 
out  of  every  100  American  seagoing  steamships  over  100 
tons,  for  the  past  seven  years,  on  the  average  2.24  have 
been  lost  each  year;  that  out  of  every  100  foreign  seagoing 
steamers  over  100  tons,  for  the  same  period  on  the  average 
1.98  have  been  lost  each  year."  (See  also  An.  Rep.  Com. 
Nav.,  1904,  p.  19.) 


■■^-"  -i-. 


><■ 


A  MoDHRx  Ci.ii'i'KK  Ship  and  a  Moukkx  Jjrig 
By  courtesy  of  Mtinsey's  Magazine 


DURING  A   HALF   CENTURY   OF   DEPRESSION      319 

When  American  ships  were  supreme  they  were  insured 
at  a  less  rate  than  those  of  any  other  nation,  and  the  in- 
surance was  placed,  to  a  large  extent,  in  England.  Be- 
cause the  American  sailor  of  the  sail,  who  had  been 
evolved  by  200  years  of  American  environment,  was  able 
to  handle  his  ship  better  than  any  other,  he  paid  lower 
premiums  to  the  underwriters.  But  if  this  be  true  (and  no 
one  disputes  it),  it  follows  that  the  higher  percentage  of 
losses  among  modern  American  steamers  proves  that  the 
American  environment,  since  the  steamer  era,  has  pro- 
duced a  steamship  sailor  who  is  less  efficient  in  his  work 
than  our  old-time  sailor  of  the  sail  was  in  his,  and  less 
efficient,  too,  than  the  foreign  steamship  sailor  of  the 
present  day.  It  is  an  important  fact  that  a  man  may  win 
laurels  upon  the  weather  yard-arm  in  reefing  topsails  and 
yet  be  of  no  particular  value  as  an  oiler  or  an  assistant 
engineer  in  the  engine-room.  At  any  rate,  any  effort 
to  revive  the  American  merchant  marine  will  have  to  be 
made  in  the  face  of  the  record  of  American  losses,  and  the 
influence  of  that  record  upon  insurance  rates. 

Then  in  spite  of  the  "boundless  resources  of  our  country," 
and  "the  intelligence  of  the  masses,"  and  a  "protective 
tariff"  of  twenty-five  cents  a  bushel,  the  farmers  of  "the 
overcrowded  nations  of  Europe"  are  able  to  sell  potatoes 
in  New  York  at  a  profit.  And  millions  of  dollars'  worth 
of  factory  goods  made  in  Europe  pay  ocean  freights,  pay 
the  tariff  tax,  pay  the  commissions  of  agents,  pay  the 
freight  rates  on  our  railroads,  pay  the  margin  of  our  retail 


320 


THE   STORY   OF   THE   MERCHANT   MARINE 


merchants,  and  are  then  sold  at  our  doors  in  competition 
with  the  products  of  our  workmen. 

The  fact  that  the  tariff  wall  fails  to  keep  out  foreign 
goods  is  a  matter  for  serious  attention  in  every  point  of 
view,  but  it  seems  especially  necessary  here  to  consider 
the  influence  of  "  protection,"  as  it  is  called,  upon  those  fea- 
tures of  American  character  which  we  call  self-reliance 
and  the  spirit  of  enterprise.  Under  the  prevailing  system 
how  is  it  possible  for  the  American  people  to  develop  the 
aggressive  manhood  that  is  needed  ? 

One  other  feature  of  the  opposition  that  wmII  be  en- 
countered in  any  effort  to  create  a  new  American  merchant 
marine  is  yet  to  be  described  —  the  support  which  the  ex- 
isting carriers  will  receive  from  their  governments  during 
the  conflict ;  but  before  that  is  considered  it  may  be  w-ell  to 
review  the  means  by  which  it  has  been  proposed  to  increase 
our  shipping. 

Naturally  a  people  accustomed  to  "protection" — a 
people  who  make  boast  of  a  system  that  is  at  best  a  confes- 
sion of  alack  of  ability  to  meet  open  competition  —  have 
turned,  first  of  all,  to  "government  aid." 

Among  the  first  provisions  of  Congress  for  the  benefit  of 
American  shipping  after  the  adoption  of  the  Constitution 
was  a  lo  per  cent  discriminating  duty  on  all  goods  im- 
ported in  foreign  ships.  It  is  asserted  that  this  discriminat- 
ing duty  supplied  our  ships  with  cargoes  from  foreign  ports 
to  American,  and  was  thus  a  feasible  and  satisfactory 
"protection."     A  lo  per  cent  duty  amounted  then,  and  it 


DURING   A   HALF   CENTURY   OF   DEPRESSION      321 

would  amount  now,  to  more  than  the  whole  freight,  upon 
some  goods.  It  is  also  asserted  that  this  discrimination 
was  made  in  order  to  "protect"  our  shipping.  But  in  an 
extended  argument,  which  was  made  before  the  Merchant 
Marine  Commission  (in  the  Report  of  which  the  curious 
reader  can  find  it),  by  Hon,  E.  T.  Chamberlain,  Commis- 
sioner of  Navigation,  it  was  proved  that  "  in  the  minds  of 
those  that  applied"  it  (Jefferson,  Clay,  Gallatin,  John 
Quincy  Adams,  etc.),  the  law  was  provided  as  a  means  of 
retaliation  only  —  for  the  purpose  of  preventing  discrimi- 
nation against  American  shipping.  The  fact  that  our 
government  anxiously  strove  from  the  first  to  secure  fair 
reciprocity  confirms  this  view.  Further  confirmation  is 
found  in  the  fact  that  our  old-time  ship-owners  were 
unanimous  in  their  support  of  the  government  in  its  efforts 
to  secure  reciprocity. 

Those  who  advocate  the  policy  of  discrimination  for 
modern  application  assert  that  our  shipping  reached  su- 
premacy at  sea  while  the  discriminating  policy  prevailed 
as  to  Great  Britain,  and  that  is  true,  because  the  British 
did  not  accept  our  offers  of  reciprocity  until  1849.  But 
the  assertion  that  our  shipping  became  supreme  because  of 
this  policy  is  made  only  by  those  who  are  unable  to  ap- 
preciate in  full  the  facts  of  the  case.  For  our  ships  that 
were  engaged  in  the  trades  between  foreign  countries, 
beyond  the  reach  of  any  " protection "  afforded  by  "dis- 
crimination" or  any  other  artificial  stimulation,  at  one 
time  measured  a  million  tons.     Why  were  those  ships 


322     THE   STORY   OF  THE   MERCHANT  MARINE 

favored  beyond  all  others  by  the  merchants  who  loaded 
them?  Why  did  merchants  of  rival  nations — why  did 
the  British  merchants,  for  instance  —  charter  these  "Yan- 
kee" ships,  if  it  were  not  because  they  were  the  most  effi- 
cient in  the  world? 

It  is  a  slander  upon  the  American  sailor  of  the  sail  to  say 
that  he  won  the  long  pennant  through  coddling. 

As  a  system  for  modem  adoption  "discrimination"  is 
objectionable  for  three  reasons.  One  is  that  it  provides 
at  best  for  keeping  our  ships  in  trades  between  home  and 
foreign  ports  only;  it  does  not  provide  for  trade  between 
foreign  ports.  Next  it  is  a  system  for  supporting  ships 
that  are  confessedly  inferior  to  those  already  in  the  trades  — 
it  places  a  premium  upon  inefficiency.  Last  of  all  it  is  a 
system  that  must  excite  all  foreign  governments  to  retalia- 
tion ;  and  that  those  governments  will  be  eager  to  retaliate, 
and  that  they  will  find  ways  enough  for  doing  so,  is  beyond 
doubt.  In  connection  with  this  statement  it  is  necessary 
to  keep  in  mind  that  we  shall  soon  cease  to  export  wheat  in 
any  form,  and  the  growth  of  population  is  so  great  that  we 
shall  soon  cease  to  export  other,  perhaps  all  other,  food 
products.     Before  inviting  retaliation  we  must  look  ahead. 

Indirect  discrimination  has  been  proposed.  Under  this 
the  ships  of  any  country  were  to  be  permitted  to  bring  in 
without  discrimination  goods  produced  under  their  flag;  but 
goods  brought  from  any  other  country  were  to  be  sub- 
jected to  a  discriminating  tax.  Any  analysis  of  our  im- 
ports, however,  shows  that  if  British  goods  were  taxed  when 


DURING   A   HALF   CENTURY   OF   DEPRESSION 


323 


brought  here  in  any  but  British  ships,  all  such  goods  would 
be  forced  into  British  ships  at  once,  to  the  great  advantage 
of  the  British  shipping.  They  could  not  at  present,  nor 
for  years  to  come,  be  forced  into  American  cargo  carriers. 
As  the  system  would  in  like  manner  help  German  ship- 
ping, the  policy  would  but  make  our  task  the  harder. 

Before  considering  the  policy  of  paying  direct  subsidies  a 
glance  at  the  oft-repeated  assertion  that  our  shipping  is 
"our  one  unprotected  industry"  seems  necessary.  What 
does  "protection"  provide  for  any  industry,  or  what  does 
it  pretend  to  provide  ?  Simply  the  home  market  —  this 
and  nothing  more,  at  best.  This  is  done  by  laying  a  tariff 
upon  imports.  But  the  American  shipping  is  now  and  al- 
ways has  been  protected  that  far  —  absolutely  protected, 
in  fact,  by  prohibition.  The  importation  of  ships  has  been 
forbidden,  and  the  use  of  foreign  ships  in  the  "home 
market"  has  been  reserved  to  home-built  ships  for  nearly 
100  years.  If  "protection"  could  enable  any  industry 
to  expand  from  the  "home  market"  to  the  foreign,  then 
the  coasting  trade  industry  should  have  expanded  long 
since  over  all  the  world.  Unhappily,  however,  the  profit 
found  in  well-protected  industries  docs  but  tend  to  make 
the  beneficiaries  contented,  and  willing  to  let  well  enough 
alone. 

Ever  since  the  Civil  War  efforts  have  been  made  to  in- 
duce Congress  to  modify  the  navigation  laws  far  enough  to 
enable  Americans  to  buy  ships  in  the  cheapest  market  and 
sail  them  under  the  flag.     It  is  said  that  this  would  give 


324     THE   STORY   OF   THE   MERCHANT   MARINE 

our  shipyards  so  much  employment  in  repairing  the  for- 
eign fleet  so  to  be  purchased  tliat  our  builders  would  soon 
learn  how  to  set  afloat  ships  as  cheap  as  any  in  the  world. 
It  is  not  easy  to  treat  seriously  one  who  supposes  that  re- 
pairing tramps  would  develop  the  distinctive  type  of  ship 
able  to  produce  results  in  ton-miles,  which  is  imperatively 
needed;  but  when  it  is  remembered  that  free  trade  in  ships 
quickly  drove  the  British  from  the  sailing  ship  to  the  screw 
steamer,  the  proposition  looks  attractive.  For  free  trade  — 
the  necessity  of  swimming  unaided  in  rough  water  or 
drowning  —  might  compel  the  American  builder  to  pro- 
duce the  revolution-making  ship  for  which  we  are  to  hope. 

We  now  come  to  the  policy  of  paying  direct  bounties  as  a 
means  of  creating  a  merchant  marine;  and  nowhere  are 
candor  and  accuracy  of  statement  more  important. 

Bounties  were  paid  in  the  colonial  days.  Virginia  gave 
a  subsidy  of  tobacco  to  induce  her  people  to  build  ships, 
and  they  built  one  ship.  When  the  whale  fishery  was  de- 
pressed, just  after  the  Revolution,  Massachusetts  gave  a 
bounty  on  Massachusetts  oil,  with  the  result  that  the  market 
was  flooded,  and  the  fishery  was  depressed  more  than  ever. 
In  spite  of  a  bounty  paid  on  oil  by  Rhode  Island,  her  sailors 
continued  to  favor  the  slave-trade.  For  some  reason  those 
who  favor  subsidies  as  a  means  of  reviving  our  shipping 
never  quote  these  facts. 

Of  the  effect  of  subsidies  upon  the  Collins  Line  and  of 
other  subsidies,  something  has  already  been  said.  The 
first  grant  to  the  Cunard  Company  was  made  for  military 


DURING   A   HALF   CENTURY  OF  DEPRESSION      325 

and  diplomatic  purposes  only,  but  when  subsidized  Ameri- 
can ships  appeared,  the  Cunard  grant  was  increased  to 
maintain  the  British  flag  in  the  trade.  That  is  a  fact  be- 
yond dispute. 

It  is  manifest  that  the  subsidy  was  of  benefit  to  the 
receiver.  It  helped  the  company  to  build  improved  ships. 
It  gave  the  builders  some  experience.  It  provided  schools 
for  the  instruction  of  seamen  in  the  art  of  handling  steam- 
ships. The  subsidizing  of  the  Royal  Mail,  and  of  the  lines 
to  other  parts  of  the  world,  where  private  enterprise  was 
unequal  to  the  occasion,  created  an  increase  of  commerce 
as  well  as  some  addition  to  the  shipping  of  the  country. 

With  equal  candor  the  evils  of  the  system  apparent  in 
those  days  ought  to  be  told.  The  subsidized  Cunarders 
not  only  drove  off  the  American  subsidized  lines  but  they 
drove  away  the  unsubsidized  Great  Western  line.  They 
depressed  all  British  shippiftg  that  entered  the  trade  to  New 
York  and  Boston.  If  they  had  had  a  larger  subsidy  they 
would  have  spread  to  Philadelphia,  and  thus  would  have  pre- 
vented or  delayed  the  establishment  of  the  Inman  Line.  The 
British  shipping  in  the  trade  to  the  northern  ports  of  America 
was  not  increased  by  the  subsidy  to  the  Cunard  Company; 
it  was,  on  the  contrary,  restricted.  Paying  a  subsidy  to 
establish  a  line  where  no  steamers  had  traded  before,  and 
none  could  trade  without  government  aid,  was  a  very  dif- 
ferent thing  from  forcing  a  new  line  of  steamers  into  trade 
already  supplied  with  shipping,  and  even  congested.  Pay- 
ing a  fair  price  per  pound  to  a  ship  for  carrying  the  mail 


326     THE   STORY   OF   THE   MERCHANT  MARINE 

ought  not  to  be  confused  with  paying  a  subsidy.  The 
first  Cunard  mail  pay  was  not  a  subsidy;  it  was  a  low 
price  for  the  work  done.  Senator  Rusk  declared,  in  the 
document  already  quoted,  that  the  British  Post  Office 
Department  "derived  a  clear  income  of  no  less  than 
$5,280,800"  from  the  contract  in  the  first  six  years  it  was 
in  force.  After  Collins  began  running  his  ships  by  aid 
of  a  subsidy  the  British  subsidized  Cunard  to  enable  him 
to  compete. 

When  the  Collins  Line  reduced  freights  from  £'j  los 
to  £4,  commerce  was  certainly  benefited,  but  the  reduction 
was  ruinous  to  shipping.  It  was  especially  injurious  to 
the  American  packet  lines.  The  advent  of  the  subsidized 
Collins  Line  did  more  to  injure  the  American  shipping  of 
its  day  than  any  other  influence  except  that  of  the  iron  screw 
steamer. 

Then  the  effect  of  admiralty  supervision  upon  the  sub- 
sidized ships  was  an  incubus  upon  progress.  Naval  men 
are  usually  conservative,  and  conservatism  often  means 
stupidity.  Thus,  after  the  British  Dreadnought  had  de- 
monstrated the  efficiency  of  the  turbine  engine  our  Ameri- 
can naval  engineers  provided  one  battleship  with  turbines 
and  another  of  the  same  model  with  reciprocating  en- 
gines in  order  to  learn  whether  the  turbine  was  worth  in- 
stalling in  future  ships !  The  Cunard  ships  were  built  of 
wood,  long  after  iron  was  known  to  be  a  better  material, 
because  of  naval  stupidity.  Worse  yet,  when  the  re- 
quirements of  the  merchant  service  became  imperative 


DURING  A  HALF   CENTURY   OF  DEPRESSION      327 

the  rules  of  the  admiralty  were  evaded  —  ships  were  re- 
ported to  be  fit  for  war  cruisers  when  in  fact  they  were 
useful  as  transports  only. 

After  the  Civil  War,  Congress  provided  subsidies  by 
which  a  line  from  New  York  to  Rio  Janeiro,  another  from 
San  Francisco  to  China  and  Japan,  and  a  third  from  San 
Francisco  to  Hawaii,  were  established.  Under  these  con- 
tracts the  policy  did  not  have  quite  a  fair  trial.  The  bene- 
ficiaries by  activity  in  politics  created  so  much  opposition 
that  the  subsidies  were  withdrawn  before  the  effect  was 
fully  apparent. 

By  the  Act  of  March  3,  1891,  a  subsidy  was  again  pro- 
vided under  the  thin  disguise  of  paying  for  carrying  the 
mail  —  a  reprehensible  plan,  because  if  subsidies  are  justi- 
fied, they  ought  to  be  paid  openly.  The  fact  is  that  the 
methods  of  indirection  employed  by  the  advocates  of  sub- 
sidy have  done  much  to  discredit  their  system.  Under  this 
act  ships  of  8000  tons  and  a  speed  of  20  knots  receive  $4  a 
mile  "by  the  shortest  practicable  route  for  each  outward 
voyage."  Ships  of  5000  tons  and  a  speed  of  16  knots 
receive  $2  a  mile.  Ships  of  2500  tons  and  a  speed  of  14 
knots  receive  $1  a  mile,  while  those  of  1500  tons  and 
a  speed  of  12  knots  receive  "two-thirds  of  a  dollar  a  mile." 
This  act  was  designed  to  maintain  lines  of  ships  which 
would  be  useful  as  scouts,  transports,  etc.,  in  time  of  war. 

Before  stating  the  effect  of  this  law  upon  American  ship- 
ping, certain  facts  in  connection  with  the  subsidizing  of 
ships  by  the  continental  nations  of  Europe  will  be  useful.    It 


328     THE   STORY   OF   THE   MERCHANT   MARINE 

is  a  curious  fact  that  while  the  annual  reports  of  our  Com- 
missioner of  Navigation  have  for  years  given  much  space 
to  the  "progress"  of  the  British,  the  German,  and  the 
Japanese  shipping,  nothing  has  been  said  about  the  "prog- 
ress" of  the  shipping  of  France,  of  Italy,  or  Austria.  The 
progress  of  the  shipping  of  England,  Germany,  and  Japan 
is  stated  because  government  aid  is  given  to  shipping  in 
those  countries  and  shipping  makes  progress;  but  in  the 
other  countries,  where  still  more  liberal  aid  is  given  to 
shipping,  no  progress  worth  mention  is  made.  The  an- 
nual report  of  the  Commissioner  of  Navigation  is  made  a 
vehicle  for  the  dissemination  of  arguments  in  favor  of  the 
subsidy  policy. 

A  candid  examination  of  the  policy  of  Germany  shows 
that  some  aid  has  been  given  to  lines  of  ships  in  the  form 
of  liberal  pay  for  carrying  mails.  The  North  German 
Lloyd  receives  $1,330,420  per  annum  for  its  service  to 
China,  Japan,  Australia,  and  the  German  possessions  in 
the  Pacific,  The  Germans  thought  it  better  policy  to  sub- 
sidize a  line  of  merchantmen  than  to  maintain  a  line  of 
transports  to  its  colonies  as  the  United  States  has  been 
doing  in  connection  with  the  Philippines.  The  payment 
to  the  North  German  Lloyd  is  properly  called  a  subsidy; 
to  give  the  name  of  subsidy  to  all  payments  made  to 
German  steamers  for  carrying  the  mail  is  to  misrepresent 
the  facts  in  a  way  that  injures  the  cause  of  the  subsidy 
advocates  materially  in  the  eyes  of  all  who  know  the 
facts. 


DURING   A  HALF   CENTURY   OF  DEPRESSION 


329 


The  German  railroads,  which  are  owned  by  the  govern- 
ment, not  only  give  low  rates  on  goods  intended  for  ex- 
port, but  extremely  low  rates  are  provided  for  all  materials 
used  in  building  ships.  The  fact  that  special  rates  on 
railroads  are  used  to  promote  the  German  merchant  ma- 
rine is  worth  serious  consideration  in  the  United  States, 
even  though  such  rates  are  here  viewed  with  suspicion. 
The  national  laws  governing  our  railroads,  as  enforced 
now  (1910),  are  in  some  respects  an  incubus  upon  legiti- 
mate and  praiseworthy  enterprise.  Through  ignorance 
and  prejudice  the  eflforts  of  our  transportation  lines  to 
increase  our  export  trade  have  been  seriously  hampered. 

Unquestionably  subsidies  and  special  rates  were  pro- 
vided to  extend  German  influence  by  means  of  shipping. 
The  payment  of  bounties  has  been  one  feature  of  the  ex- 
pansion of  German  shipping.  To  assert  that  the  bounty 
has  been  the  sole,  or  even  the  chief,  cause  of  that  expan- 
sion, however,  is  to  misstate  the  facts.  The  experience  of 
France,  for  instance,  shows  conclusively  that  a  subsidy  in 
itself  is  not  enough  to  create  a  merchant  marine.  Al- 
though the  French  subsidy  is  so  liberal  that  French  cargo 
carriers  are  able  to  sail  half-way  around  the  world  in  ballast 
to  get  a  cargo  at  rates  that  would  be  less  than  cost  of 
maintenance  for  any  other  ship,  the  French  merchant 
marine  grows  so  slowly  as  to  justify  the  assertion,  made  by 
the  late  Captain  John  Codman,  that  the  French  mariners 
are  working  against  a  fiat  of  nature.  The  tonnage  of  1881, 
914,000,  was  but  1,952,000  in  1908. 


330     THE   STORY   OF   THE    MERCHANT   MARINE 

Further  than  that  the  German  subsidies  have  been  less 
than  those  paid  by  the  British  (especially  those  paid  to  the 
Cunard  Company),  and  yet  German  steamers  are  steadily 
encroaching  upon  those  of  the  British.  The  reason  for 
the  progress  of  German  shipping  is  readily  found  in  the 
spirit  and  habits  of  the  people.  Consider  the  work  of  the 
patient,  spectacled  scientist  in  his  laboratory  —  his  methods 
and  his  aims;  consider  the  growth  of  the  factory  system; 
consider  the  effect  of  the  training  which  all  men  receive  in 
the  army  or  navy  —  how  the  whole  people  learn  to  move 
as  one  man,  and  as  comrades,  for  the  attainment  of  a 
worthy  national  object ;  consider  how  all  the  people  — 
the  men  with  the  hoe  as  well  as  the  men  behind  the  guns  — 
are  stirred  by  an  attack,  or  a  seeming  attack,  upon  the 
Fatherland. 

The  effect  of  government  bounties  upon  German  ship- 
ping is  like  that  seen  when  the  spectacled  German  professor 
of  agriculture  applies  inorganic  fertilizers  to  crops  planted 
in  well-cultivated,  humus-filled  soils.  The  effect  in  France, 
and  other  nations  not  well  prepared  for  expansion,  is  like  that 
when  those  fertilizers  are  applied  to  arid,  acid,  uncultivated 
land.  In  Germany  the  soil  for  the  production  of  shipping 
was  in  excellent  condition  before  the  fertilizer  was  applied. 
What  is  the  condition  of  that  soil  in  the  United  States? 

The  American  subsidy  law  has  been  in  operation  since 
1891.  For  the  service  rendered  it  provides  more  liberal 
compensation  than  that  given  to  any  German  ship.  The 
American  Line  (now  operated  as  a  part  of  the  fleet  of  the 


DURING   A   HALF   CENTURY   OF  DEPRESSION       331 

International  Mercantile  Marine  Company),  owns  two 
American  ships  that  were  built  for  the  line  and  two  British 
ships  that  were  placed  under  the  American  flag  by  special 
act  of  Congress.  The  subsidy  maintains  this  line  in  exist- 
ence but  does  not  increase  it.  The  Mallory  line  has  been 
extended  somewhat  since  the  subsidy  was  given  to  it. 
Elsewhere  ships  that  were  maintained  under  the  subsidy 
have  been  driven  from  their  route  by  foreign  competition. 
The  ships  run  in  connection  with  the  Great  Northern  Rail- 
road, for  instance,  were  unable  tocompetewith  the  Japanese 
line  between  the  same  ports,  partly  because  the  Japanese 
subsidy  was  more  liberal,  and  partly  because  of  the  greater 
expense  of  running  American  ships.  In  short,  the  law  of 
1 89 1  has  failed  to  provide  an  American  merchant  marine. 
Further  measures  for  providing  subsidies  have  there- 
fore been  proposed.  The  Merchant  Marine  Commission, 
after  a  lengthened  inquiry,  offered  a  bill  to  Congress  which 
was  to  provide  a  line  from  "a  port  of  the  Atlantic  coast 
of  the  United  States  to  Brazil,"  with  "ships  of  not  less  than 
fourteen  knots  speed,"  at  a  subsidy  rate  of  $150,000  a  year. 
"for  a  monthly  service,"  or  $300,000  for  a  fortnightly  ser- 
vice. A  similar  line  to  the  River  Plate  was  to  receive 
$187,500  and  $350,000  according  to  the  service.  The 
same  subsidy  was  to  be  paid  to  a  12-knot  line  to  South 
Africa.  Three  lines  from  Gulf  ports  to  Cuba,  Brazil,  and 
Mexico  were  to  be  paid  sums  in  proportion  to  the  service 
rendered,  and  three  lines  were  to  be  provided  for  the  Pacific 
on  similar  terms. 


332     THE   STORY   OF  THE  MERCHANT  MARINE 

In  addition  to  providing  these  lines  an  attempt  was  to  be 
made  to  set  afloat  cargo  carriers  by  giving  an  annual  bounty 
of  $5  a  ton  gross  measurement  to  all  cargo  ships  con- 
tinuously in  service.  On  the  whole  ten  new  lines  of  ships 
were  to  be  established  at  an  expense  of  $2,590,000,  and  it 
was  supposed  that  $10,000,000  might  be  the  necessary 
limit  of  the  subsidy  for  the  tramps.  In  the  meantime  it  was 
supposed  that  the  existing  lines  working  under  the  law  of 
1 89 1  would  continue  in  the  service  for  the  compensation 
provided. 

Passing  over  the  claptrap  in  the  bill  about  the  use  of 
these  liners  as  scouts,  —  fancy  a  i6-knot  merchantman 
scouting  around  a  squadron  of  Dreadnoughts !  —  the  bill 
ought  to  be  considered  on  its  merits  because  it  sets  forth 
the  amount  of  subsidy  supposed  to  be  sufficient  to  create 
a  real  revival  of  our  shipping,  and  thus  gives  an  idea,  per- 
haps, of  what  sum  would  be  adequate. 

Accepting  the  Commission's  statement  that  the  subsi- 
dies would  prove  sufficient  to  place  the  more  expensive 
American  ships  upon  an  equality  with  the  foreign,  and  ''a 
little  more,"  as  was  said,  it  may  be  assumed  that  the  new 
lines  would  eventually  employ  sixty  or  seventy  ships.  At 
$5  a  ton  the  $10,000,000  might  put  afloat  from  300  to  400 
modern  cargo  carriers.  Thus  we  should,  at  best,  about 
double  our  present  registered  fleet,  which,  in  1908,  num- 
bered 478  ships.  But  if  we  compare  that  fleet  with  the 
German,  which  now  numbers  more  than  2500  ships,  or 
with  the  British,  which  now  numbers  more  than  4000, 


DURING   A   HALF   CENTURY   OF  DEPRESSION      ^^^ 

we  shall  see  that  even  under  the  best  circumstances  we 
should  yet  be  a  far  cry  from  the  supremacy  of  which  we 
made  boast  in  other  days.  Indeed,  the  fleet  of  liners 
would  not  number  as  many  ships  as  the  Standard  Oil 
Company  now  employs  to  carry  abroad  its  products, 
while  the  fleet  of  cargo  carriers  could  not  be  compared, 
with  any  satisfaction,  to  the  fleet  now  in  use  by  the  allied 
German  companies  of  which  mention  has  been  made. 

And  the  ships  thus  to  be  set  afloat,  as  they  crossed  the 
seas,  would  proclaim  to  the  world  that  they  were  in  the  carry- 
ing trade,  not  by  right  of  efficiency,  but  by  grace  of  a  subsidy. 

But  now  we  are  to  consider  whether  any  subsidy  here- 
tofore proposed  would  really  be  sufficient  to  sustain  either 
liner  or  tramp.  The  effect  of  such  ships  upon  freight 
rates,  for  instance,  was  stated  before  the  Merchant  Marine 
Commission,  by  B.  N.  Baker,  formerly  president  of  the 
Atlantic  Transport  Company,  and  an  advocate  of  the 
subsidy  system.     He  said  :  — 

"If  you  added  any  more  to  the  open  sea  traffic  (the  for- 
eign trafific)  of  the  United  States  than  100,000  tons  a  year 
you  would  so  demoralize  the  general  carrying  business  in 
rates,  both  as  to  freight  and  passengers,  it  would  be  so  un- 
profitable that  no  one  could  go  into  it,  unless  you  would 
double,  and  triple  that  compensation.^' 

The  effect  of  that  building  programme  upon  the  organ- 
ized mechanics  of  our  shipyards  —  the  strikes  for  higher 
wages,  and  the  consequent  increase  of  prices  —  need  only 
be  mentioned. 


334     THE   STORY   OF   THE   MERCHANT  MARINE 

Then  figure  up  the  expense  of  the  war  between  the  lines 
from  New  York  to  South  Africa  in  1902,  wherein  ships  lost 
$15,000  in  a  single  voyage.  Manifestly  the  American 
liners  would  need  all  of  their  subsidy  ($15,625,  per  voyage) 
to  meet  the  reductions  in  freight  rates  which  the  opposition 
would  make.  They  would  thus  be  no  better  off  than  they 
would  be  if  they  were  permitted  to  enter  the  trade  on  even 
terms  with  the  present  lines  —  without  war  and  without 
subsidy.  The  line  to  Brazil  would  yet  have  to  face  the  dis- 
advantages due  to  the  triangular  service  which  British 
ships  maintain,  though  the  decreasing  exports  of  American 
food  products  would  reduce  those  disadvantages  somewhat. 

In  short,  one  may  well  doubt  whether  the  proposed  sub- 
sidy would  enable  our  ships  to  overcome  the  opposition  of 
the  powerful  foreign  interests  that  are  already  in  the  trade. 
But  if  we  suppose  it  to  suffice  that  far,  w^e  have  yet  to  in- 
quire what  the  governments  behind  those  powerful  cor- 
porations would  do.  Recall  the  story  of  the  Cunarders 
Mauretania  and  Lusitania.  The  British  government  gave 
those  two  ships  to  the  company  outright  on  the  understand- 
ing that  it  should  operate  and  maintain  them  in  a  con- 
dition fit  to  cross  the  Atlantic  at  a  speed  of  25  knots  an 
hour.  This  was  done  at  the  time  that  American  capitalists 
acquired  control  of  a  number  of  British  lines,  under  the 
name  of  the  International  Mercantile  Marine  Company, 
and  formed  a  working  agreement  with  the  two  leading 
German  companies.  This  combination  threatened  Brit- 
ish supremacy  on  the  North  Atlantic,  or  was  believed  to 


^    ^ 


DURING   A   HALF   CENTURY   OF  DEPRESSION      335 

threaten  it,  and  the  whole  British  nation  rose  up  to  defend, 
figuratively  speaking.  If  that  were  possible  under  those 
circumstances,  it  is  certain  that  the  "subventions"  now 
given  to  the  British  lines  would  be  increased  the  moment 
any  American  subsidized  ships  began  to  cut  into  the  British 
carrying  trade.  Increased  subsidies  would  then  be  needed 
by  the  American  ships.  If  the  American  people  were  to 
enter  into  a  subsidy  war  it  is  likely  that  they  could  endure 
the  strain  longer  than  any  other  nation ;  but  is  such  a  war 
worth  while  to  secure  a  part  in  a  trafific  that  pays  the  well- 
subsidized  Cunard  line  no  higher  profit  than  2.8  per  cent  a 
year? 

One  more  argument  in  favor  of  subsidy  is  yet  to  be 
considered.  With  the  Panama  Canal  and  the  Monroe 
Doctrine  to  defend,  it  is  necessary  to  provide  sufficient 
transports  and  colliers  for  the  exigencies  of  war.  The 
spectacle  of  our  splendid  war  fleet  steaming  around  the 
world  with  its  fuel  carried  in  ships  under  foreign  flags, 
was  humiliating  to  the  nation.  Congress  should  build 
auxiliaries  more  rapidly  by  direct  appropriation,  or  it 
should  give  ample  subsidies,  however  great  the  sums  needed, 
to  maintain  auxiliary  ships  in  the  merchant  service.  Many 
Americans  would  gladly  pay  their  share  of  the  tax  for  the 
pleasure  of  seeing  the  American  flag  above  a  ship's  taffrail, 
now  and  then  on  salt  water,  in  spite  of  the  humiliation  of  the 
fact  that  it  was  the  tax  and  not  efficiency  that  kept  the  flag 
in  place.  A  merchant  fleet  so  provided  would  be  a  kind  of 
insurance  against  the  exigencies  of  war,  and  even  against 


336     THE   STORY   OF   THE   MERCHANT  MARINE 

war  itself.  With  a  thousand  American  merchant  ships 
afloat  on  deep  water  there  would  be  less  danger  of  an  ag- 
gressive nation  of  Europe  invading  Rio  Grande  do  Sul  or 
menacing  the  Panama  Canal. 

Whether  to  provide  the  auxiliaries  by  direct  appro- 
priation or  by  subsidy  is,  or  should  be,  a  question  of 
relative  expense  and  efficiency.  Such  a  question,  one  would 
think,  might  be  solved  by  the  rules  of  arithmetic;  at  any 
rate  it  is  not  necessary  in  the  discussion  to  misrepresent 
the  attitude  of  senators  from  Southern  States,  nor  to  say 
that  the  former  American  supremacy  was  due  to  "protec- 
tion" instead  of  the  ability  of  the  sailor  of  the  sail. 

There  are  excellent  and  perhaps  imperative  diplomatic 
and  military  reasons  for  maintaining  at  least  one  line  of 
swift  steamers  from  the  Pacific  coast  to  the  coast  of  Asia 
and  the  Philippine  Islands.  The  ships  of  this  line,  if 
established,  should  be  fitted,  as  battleships  are,  for  a 
cruising  speed  of  say  sixteen  knots,  with  a  reserve  of  power 
for  an  emergency,  when  they  should  be  able  to  develop  real 
scout  speed  —  should  be  able  to  run  away  from  the  modern 
twenty-one  knot  battleships.  The  value  of  a  fleet  of  ships 
of  this  kind,  in  a  military  point  of  view,  and  especially 
upon  the  Pacific,  is  obvious.  A  dozen  ships  of  the  kind 
would  not  be  too  many.  A  fleet  of  smaller  ships,  fit  for 
use  as  naval  colliers,  might  well  be  maintained  to  gather 
and  distribute  cargo  along  the  Asiatic  coast  and  among 
the  islands.  We  have  undertaken  the  work  of  developing 
civilization  in  the  Far  East,  and  we  need  to  do  everything 


DURING  A   HALF  CENTURY   OF   DEPRESSION       337 

possible  to  prevent  an  attack  upon  our  position  there. 
After  squadrons  of  war-sliips  nothing  will  create  a 
higher  respect  for  our  flag  among  the  people  of  that  region 
than  a  fleet  of  superior  merchantmen  avowedly  main- 
tamed  for  diplomatic  and  military  reasons.  In  fact  a 
fleet  so  maintained  would  impress  other  peoples  than  those 
of  the  Far  East. 

The  same  argument  may  be  made  for  the  maintenance 
of  swift  lines  to  both  coasts  of  South  America,  where  we 
have  the  Monroe  Doctrine  and  the  Panama  Canal  to  de- 
fend. If  we  establish  these  lines,  a  war  of  subsidies  is 
to  be  expected,  and  the  well-established  and  powerful 
companies  already  in  the  trades  will  be  wholly  unscrupulous 
in  their  opposition,  not  because  their  present  profits  are 
high,  but  because  they  are  low;  a  division  of  the  traffic 
will  still  further  reduce  the  profits  which  are  already  too 
narrow  for  comfort.  We  may  be  sure,  too,  that  extrava- 
gance and  inefficiency  of  the  Collins  kind  will  be  found  in 
the  management  of  some  of  our  companies ;  but  as  a  dip- 
lomatic and  military  measure  the  experiment  seems  \o  be 
worth  making.  We  have  a  very  good  precedent  in  the 
action  of  Germany  in  establishing  a  line  to  its  Pacific 
possessions  by  a  subsidy  of  a  million  a  year,  which  is  given 
for  the  precise  reasons  urged  herein.  It  will  cost  the  United 
States  many  times  as  much  as  it  does  Germany,  but  one 
who  looks  at  the  matter  broadly  may  well  suppose  that 
such  an  increase  of  expenses,  avowedly  made  as  a  measure 
for  increased  military  efficiency,  might  be  worth  while,  in 


338     THE   STORY   OF   THE    MERCHANT   MARINE 

the  end,  as  a  peace  measure.  For  we  shall  be  obliged  in 
any  event,  to  go  on  increasing  our  naval  budget  to  keep 
even  with  the  growth  of  European  navies,  until  the  war 
burden  becomes  intolerable  in  Europe  as  well  as  in  the 
United  States;  and  then  we  shall  have  measures  for 
preserving  peace  more  rational  than  those  now  in  vogue. 
The  sooner  the  burden  is  made  intolerable  the  better. 

But  while  we  can  provide  an  ample  fleet  of  naval  aux- 
iliaries by  means  of  subsidies,  if  we  are  willing  to  pay  the 
price,  let  no  one  suppose  that  such  a  measure  will  give  the 
country  any  share  of  the  world's  traffic  worth  considera- 
tion, not  to  more  than  mention  supremacy  upon  deep 
water. 

One  method  by  which  the  Merchant  Marine  Commission 
thought  to  increase  American  sea  power  is  memorable. 
A  heavy  tonnage  tax  was  to  be  laid  upon  all  ships  com- 
ing from  foreign  countries  to  American  ports,  and  the 
money  so  raised  was  to  be  paid  to  American  ships  in  the 
foreign  trade  in  return  for  carrying  a  certain  proportion 
of  American  citizens  enrolled  as  members  of  a  corps  of 
naval  volunteers.  The  measure  looked  toward  an  in- 
crease in  the  number  of  American  seamen,  but  it  did  not 
become  a  law. 

The  communities  that  have  supported  nautical  schools 
(New  York  and  Boston,  for  example)  have  had  the  end 
in  view  for  which  the  measure  of  the  commission  was 
designed.  Graduates  of  these  schools  are  among  the  best 
officers  in  our  merchant  marine,  and  this,  too,  in  spite  of 


DURING   A   HALF   CENTURY   OF   DEPRESSION      339 

the  fact  that  antiquated  ships  of  the  sail  formerly  served 
as  school  rooms,  and  the  boys  were  taught  to  handle  the 
obsolete  marline-spike  instead  of  the  throttle.  But,  at  best, 
these  efforts  to  turn  ambitious  young  Americans  from  the 
opportunities  they  find  on  land  are  inadequate.  Con- 
gress might  have  turned  the  naval  academy  into  a  splendid 
nautical  university  for  the  education  of  all  Americans  who 
wish  to  learn  the  ways  of  the  sea.  We  appropriate  millions 
a  year  for  the  farmers,  not  as  bounties  on  their  products, 
but  to  teach  them,  through  experiment  stations,  how  to  do 
their  work.  No  one  seems  to  have  thought  it  worth  while, 
however,  to  make  a  national  appropriation  for  the  education 
of  merchant  seamen. 

To  confess  the  truth  we  have  done  nothing  adequate  to 
the  situation  since  the  Civil  War,  nor  has  anything  adequate 
been  attempted;  but  the  people  who  have  promoted  the 
work  of  our  nautical  schools  have  seen  dimly  what  the  whole 
story  of  the  American  merchant  marine  proclaims.  The 
pretty  pinnace  Virginia  thirty  feet  long,  as  she  crossed  and 
recrossed  the  Atlantic;  the  Trial  in  the  Azores  and  the 
West  Indies;  the  Mount  Vernon  as  she  dodged  pirates, 
privateers,  and  war  fleets  in  her  seventeen-day  passage  from 
Salem  to  Gibraltar ;  the  Empress  of  China  in  her  venture 
to  the  Far  East;  the  sealers  among  the  icy  rocks  of  the 
Antarctic;  the  whalers  beyond  Bering's  Straits;  the  packets 
of  the  sail  as  they  crossed  from  New  York  to  Liverpool; 
and  the  clippers  that  flaunted  the  Stars  and  Stripes  off 
the  weather  beam  of  every  ship  they  met  on  the  Seven 


340     THE   STORY   OF   THE   MERCHANT   MARINE 

Seas,  —  in  short,  the  whole  story  of  the  American  merchant 
marine  has  been  worth  consideration  here  because  it 
sets  forth  unmistakably  that  the  superior  intrinsic  efficiency 
of  the  American  sailor  of  the  sail,  during  the  contest  that 
culminated  with  the  perfection  of  the  ship  of  the  sail,  gave 
supremacy  to  the  American  flag.  We  can  buy  ships  — 
whole  fleets  of  them  —  if  we  are  willing  to  pay  the  price, 
and  we  can  maintain  them  upon  the  high  seas  in  like 
manner ;  but  we  shall  never  again  see  the  Stars  and  Stripes 
triumphant  upon  the  high  seas  until  the  American  environ- 
ment evolves,  once  more,  by  natural  process,  the  nautical 
unit  as  efficient  for  the  modern  day  as  was  our  ship  of 
the  sail  in  the  days  long  past. 


Stories  from  American  History 


Yankee  Ships  and  Yankee  Sailors 

By  JAMES  BARNES 

Tales  of  1812,  by  the  author  of  "Drake  and  his  Yeomen,"  "  For  King 
and  Country,"  etc.  Illustrated  by  R.  F,  Zogbaum  and  Carlton  T. 
Chapman. 

Cloth,  $/.jo 

The  Wilderness  Road 

By  H.  ADDINGTON  BRUCE 

The  central  figure  in  this  story  of  the  early  development  of  the 
Middle  West  is  Daniel  Boone,  the  man  who  blazed  the  famous  Wil- 
derness road.  In  telling  his  story  Mr.  Bruce  touches  on  such  matters 
as  the  economic  and  social  factors  influencing  the  movement  across 
the  mountains,  and  the  significance  of  that  movement  with  relation  to 
the  growth  of  revolutionary  sentiment  in  the  American  colonies,  etc. 
To  be  illustrated. 

In  preparation 

The  Story  of  the  Great  Lakes 

By  EDWARD  CHANNING  and  MARION  F.  LANSING 

The  Professor  of  American  History  in  Harvard  University,  author  of 
a  number  of  volumes  on  the  History  of  the  United  States,  has  found 
an  immense  amount  of  romance  is  centred  about  the  Great  Lakes, 
from  the  time  of  their  discovery  and  early  exploration  by  the  French 
missionaries  down  to  the  present  time  wlien  they  play  so  important  a 
part  in  the  industrial  progress  of  the  Middle  West.  This  book  tells 
the  story  of  these  great  inland  waterways,  with  special  reference  to 
those  picturesque  aspects  of  history  which  interest  the  general  reader. 
Illustrated. 

Cloth,  $  I. so  net 

The  Story  of  Old  Fort  Loudon 

By  CHARLES  EGBERT  CRADDOCK 

A  Tale  of  the  Cherokees  and  the  Pioneers  of  Tennessee,  1760,  by  the 
author  of  "The  Prophet  of  the  Great  Smoky  Mountain."  Illustrated 
by  Ernest  C.  Peixotto. 

Cloth,  $1.30 


STORIES  FROM  AMERICAN  HISTORY  -  Con  ^mue</ 


Southern  Soldier  Stories 

By  GEORGE  GARY  EGGLESTON 

Forty-seven  stories  illustrating  the  heroism  of  those  brave  Americans 
who  fought  on  the  losing  side  in  the  Civil  War.  Humor  and  pathos 
are  found  side  by  side  in  these  pages,  which  bear  evidence  of  absolute 
truth.     Illustrated  by  R.  F.  ZoGBAUM. 

xi  +  2j/  pages.     Cloth,  $  i.^o 


Tales  of  the  Enchanted  Isles  of  the  Atlantic 

By  THOMAS  WENTWORTH  HIGGINSON 

Legends  showing  that  the  people  of  Europe  were  for  centuries  fed 
with  romances  of  marvellous  and  beautiful  countries  beyond  the 
Atlantic.  Besides  the  early  Irish,  Spanish,  and  other  traditions  of 
the  Happy  Islands  of  the  West,  there  come  to  us,  among  others  from 
our  own  race,  the  old  stories  of  King  Arthur  and  his  Avalon;  of 
St.  Brandan's  Isle ;  of  the  Voyages  of  Erik  the  Viking;  and  of  the 
vanishing  Norumbega,  so  real  a  vision  to  the  imaginations  of  Queen 
Elizabeth's  day.     Illustrated  by  Albert  Herter. 

Cloih,  $/.jo 


De  Soto  and  His  Men  in  the  Land  of  Florida 

By  GRACE  KING 

The  author  of  "  New  Orleans :  The  Place  and  the  People  "  has  col- 
lected into  an  entertaining  volume  stories  of  the  brilliant  armada 
which  sailed  westward  under  De  Soto  in  1538  to  subdue  the  natives 
and  bring  this  country  under  the  Spanish  crown.  Old  Spanish  and 
Portuguese  narratives  are  the  basis  of  its  history.  Illustrated  by 
George  Gibes. 

C/oiA,  $  /.JO 


STORIES  FROM  AMERICAN  HISTORY  —  Continued 


The  Story  of  the  New  England  Whalers 

By  JOHN  R.  SPEARS  ' 

Some  of  the  most  romantic  and  adventurous  characters  in  American 
history  are  dealt  with  in  this  book,  in  which  Mr.  Spears  tells  the  story 
of  the  American  whaling  industry.  He  has  given  us  the  life  stories 
of  the  men  who  made  New  Bedford,  Nantucket,  and  Marblehead  — 
the  men  to  whom  more  than  to  any  others  was  due  the  upbuilding  of 
the  American  merchant  service  in  the  early  days  of  the  Republic. 
Illustrated  from  photographs. 

"  Whalers,  whaling,  and  whales  are  described  in  full  detail  in  this  in- 
teresting and  very  valuable  volume.  In  its  completeness  and  accuracy 
it  is  an  important  addition  to  the  history  of  the  United  States  to 
which  Mr.  Spears  previously  has  been  a  liberal  contributor.  .  .  . 
Several  illustrations  showing  the  old  ships  and  the  fights  of  their 
hardy  crews  with  the  whales  add  to  the  picturesque  realism  of  a 
fascinating  and  important  volume."  —  Boston  Transcript. 

*  Cloth,  $i.jo 


Buccaneers  and  Pirates  of  Our  Coast 

By  FRANK  R.  STOCKTON 

This  book  is  an  account  —  with  efforts  to  sift  falsifying  legend  and 
preserve  the  truth  —  of  the  offshoots  of  the  early  English,  French, 
and  Dutch  combinations  against  Spanish  exactions  in  West  India 
waters.  From  the  early  buccaneer  with  a  legitimate  purpose  came 
the  pirate  whose  greed  of  booty  was  for  private  gain.  Mr.  Stockton 
has  told  wild  stories  of  picturesque  figures  among  both  types  of 
leaders,  and  his  characteristic  quaint  turns  of  humor  set  them  off 
entertainingly.     Illustrated  by  G.  Varian  and  B.  W.  Clinedixst. 

Cloth,  $  I. so 


PUBLISHED    BY 

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MISS  AGNES  C.  LAUT'S  BOOKS 
Pathfinders  of  the  West 

BEING  THE  THRILLING  STORY  OF  THE  ADVENTURES  OF  THE  MEN 
WHO  DISCOVERED  THE  GREAT  NORTHWEST,  —  RADISSON,  LA  VEREN- 
DRVE,    LEWIS   AND    CLARK. 

Illustrated,  doth,  8vo,  $2.00  net 

"  Comprises  a  series  of  narratives  of  exploration,  told  in  attractive 
story  of  adventure.  It  traces  the  history  of  Northwest  exploration, 
from  the  beginnings  by  Radisson  in  1659,  through  its  continuation  by 
De  La  Verendrye,  who  pushed  his  way  to  the  Rocky  Mountains,  to 
its  culmination  by  Lewis  and  Clark  in  1805.  The  book  is  not  only 
one  of  value  as  history,  but  is  one  of  deep  interest,  especially  to  those 
who  find  pleasure  in  tales  of  hazardous  adventure."  —  Boston  Tran- 
script. 

"  A  thrilling  account  of  the  adventures  of  Radisson,  La  Verendrye, 
Lewis,  Clark,  and  others  who  discovered  the  great  Northwest.  The 
author's  stories  of  these  men  are  well  studied,  well  expressed,  always 
reasonable,  always  enthusiastic,  yet  never  fulsome.  .  .  .  Miss  Laut's 
simply  written  chapters  have  all  the  compelling  charm  of  good  fiction. 
Many  readers  not  accustomed  to  literature  of  this  order  will  peruse 
the  book  with  eager  delight  because  of  the  quietly  effective  manner 
in  which  the  dramatic  facts  are  presented." —  Chicago  Record- Herald. 

Vikings  of  the  Pacific 

A  CONTINUATION   OF   "  PATHFINDERS   OF   THE   WEST  " 

Illustrated,  cloth,  8vo,  $2.00  net 

"  Miss  Laut  sets  herself  the  task  of  writing  about  the  Pacific  pioneers 
and  explorers  in  popular  style,  and  she  has  achieved  a  huge  success. 
In  interest  her  stories  leave  the  historical  novel  far  in  the  rear,  for  she 
deals  in  the  first  instance  with  well-established  facts  which  are  romantic 
enough  without  imaginative  coloring.  .  .  .  Her  book  awakens  a  de- 
sire to  know  more  about  these  lusty  vikings  of  the  Pacific,  so  that  the 
measure  of  Miss  Laut's  success  is  something  more  than  to  have  written 
a  popular  book."  —  New  York  Sun. 

"  An  unusually  fascinating  subject,  treated  with  unusual  dramatic  skill 
makes  '  Vikings  of  the  Pacific  '  well  worth  reading.  .  .  .  The  pages 
of  the  book  are  full  of  the  romance  of  the  untried  seas.  One  bold  ad- 
venture succeeds  another.  .  .  .  The  illustrations  are  unique  and  of 
real  interest.  Readers  of  '  Pathfinders  of  the  West '  will  recall  with 
pleasure  the  same  quality  of  combined  scholarliness  and  vivid  human 
interest  that  distinguishes  the  new  book."  —  Chicago  Post. 


PUBLISHED    BY 

THE   MACMILLAN   COMPANY 

64-66  Fifth  Avenue,  New  York 


UNIVERSITY  OF  CALIFORNIA  LIBRARY 

Los  Angeles 

This  book  is  DUE  on  the  last  date  stamped  below. 


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